Falling is like this
by honeyandvodka
Summary: Kate startles when her fingertips catch on her necklace. She'd forgotten she was even wearing it. Unbidden, tears fall from her eyes as the gravity of Castle's betrayal hits her again. Her mom's murder. He'd been digging around; the one thing he'd promised not to do… An AU multi chapter that picks up where A Death in the Family left off… Castle keeps investigating on his own.
1. What doesn't bend breaks

Beckett can't breathe and her stomach is rolling. From the second he'd looked at her from around the corner of Will's hospital room, not with a smirk but with a measure of sympathy, she's known. There has to be a reason he's looking at her like this. Her stomach swirls and the smile drops from her face before he's even begun to explain.

"_It's about your mother."_

She doesn't hear much after that; his words assault her ears, bringing anything but their usual solace.

_Stabbing. Not random. My expert. Three other stabbings. Targeted murder._

They're all just words and they all blur together; Kate's vision goes hazy too, and she thinks she could be swaying, but she'll be damned if she's going to pass out in front of Castle. Not here. Not now.

She pushes past him; he looks for a second like he's going to stop her; he reaches his hand out ready to restrain her. The idea of his hands on her has Kate almost doubling over with the need to vomit, and she ducks out of his way and rounds the corner, turning into the first bathroom she finds.

Beckett empties the contents of her stomach. So much for the sprinkles. She sinks down onto the floor in the stall; outside the ladies' room she can hear him knocking on the door, calling her name. She groans in frustration as her phone vibrates and she scowls, throwing it against the opposite wall.

It's ineffective though, and it continues to buzz on the floor, just out of reach. Sighing, Kate stands up. She's half tempted to stand on the damn thing and shut it up for good, but she reigns herself in before she can really lose control. She settles for holding the power button down, stopping the vibration. The screen dulls, then flicks off, and she lets herself breathe, assessing the situation.

Castle's stopped knocking, but he's still outside; she's sure of it. For that matter, Will's down the hall, no doubt expecting her to come back any moment. She's not interested in seeing either of them. She's not interested in seeing anyone. She wants to go home, lock the door, shut herself in her apartment and- what? What then? Kate exits the stall and stalks to the sink. She hasn't shed a tear but in spite of that her eyes are red and puffy, and her lip gloss is everywhere; smudged from where she wiped her mouth with the back of her hand. Ugh. She splashes water on her face, takes a bunch of paper towel from the dispenser and wipes off the last of the traces of the lip gloss, oddly relieved that no tears means no streaked mascara. If she has to walk out of here, past Castle, at least she'll do it with her head held high.

She washes her hands, taking her time. She's stalling, lathering up more than she needs to, and letting the warm water rinse the suds. She pulls more paper from the dispenser, dries her hands, tosses the paper in the trash, and casts a final appraising look in the mirror; she's looked better- has she ever- but she thinks she can walk past him. And if he tries to follow her? Well, she doesn't work out for nothing. Her shock is being replaced by anger, and she's angry enough at the moment to consider throwing a punch if necessary.

She squeezes the bridge of her nose between her fingertips, forcing herself to take deep, slow, calming breaths; she's _not_ going to punch Castle. She's not. She's going to walk past him, head held high, and-

Kate opens the bathroom door. Huh. Okay. Apparently, she's going to exit the bathroom and walk straight down an empty hall, because he's not there anymore.

The unsteady clacking of her heels on the linoleum floor echoes in her head. She presses the elevator button over and over until it arrives, takes the elevator down to street level in a daze. She stumbles to the exit and hears the swoosh of the automatic doors, hailing a cab as soon as she reaches the street.

* * *

Castle knocks several times, calls her name a few times, and then he has the bright idea of phoning her; _yeah_, he thinks to himself. _Great plan_. Because dialing a woman in a bathroom; a woman who specifically went in to the bathroom to avoid you? Probably not going to work. The phone rings out the first time, and then goes straight to voicemail the second; if she hasn't switched her cell off, she's probably called Will, or worse; Esposito and Ryan. He looks around nervously, almost expecting to see the detectives marching up, ready to escort him out of here.

The hallway is empty, and Castle leans back against the wall, his head in his hands. _Way to go, Rick_, he thinks angrily. These have been some of the best months of his life and he just had to go way too far and screw the whole thing up. "Shit." He curses aloud, and slams his hand against the wall, looking around guiltily after the fact. Nobody's watching, so he doesn't have to pretend he's knocking for Kate to come out when it's really just a frustrated demonstration of how angry he is with himself.

He walks away.

He walks down the hall; slow, measured steps, and when he gets to the elevator he turns with a heavy heart; hoping (irrationally, he knows) that Kate will come out of the bathroom, that she'll walk toward him. That she'll want to talk.

She won't. He knows that. By the time he makes it to the street he's unable to see properly, hailing a cab blindly, and wiping at his eyes, embarrassed, as he gives the cab driver his address.

* * *

How could he have done this? Beckett slams the lock shut behind her and dumps her wallet and phone on the counter, stomping through the small apartment to her bedroom where she unholsters her piece and tucks it roughly into the drawer that doubles as a gun safe.

She casts her eyes around the room and sees _Storm Fall_ mocking her from her nightstand. She groans in frustration, takes the book, and pushes it under the dirty laundry in her hamper, rolling her eyes at herself even as she does so. _Way to make a problem disappear_, she thinks to herself, angrily fumbling with the buttons on her sweater and pulling her clothes off. Damn. Suddenly the casual gray shirt is as suffocating as the silence of the apartment is deafening; she can only hear Castle's voice in her head, their conversations from the past few days suddenly on repeat.

"_And if I were a better cop, I would have."_

"…_You pushed for it, not because it's your job, but because you care. Most people come up against a wall, they give up. Not you. You don't let go. You don't back down. That's what makes you extraordinary."_

Kate feels anything but extraordinary now; she feels empty, brittle.

"_When I gave you that little speech last night, I really didn't mean for you to go all "Beautiful Mind" on me."_

Yeah. Well. If he expects her to keep her grip on reality after she _told him _what her mother's case does to her- and at that thought, Beckett curses aloud. He'd started. Obviously, he'd already started looking into this. She wonders when it all began; when he decided to consult with his own expert. As soon as she'd told him? She'd _just_ begun to trust him- and she curses again. What had she been thinking, to even begin to consider him a friend?

_Stabbing. Not random. My expert. Three other stabbings. Targeted murder._

Beckett turns and opens the door to her bathroom, turning the shower faucet on; hard. Steam billows through the bathroom and she steps into the spray, letting the hot needles of water pound her back as long as she can stand it before turning the heat down to a more manageable temperature and sinking into the bath.

"_It's about your mother."_

She doesn't know how long she's been slumped there, but the heat is tapering off. Beckett stands again and turns the faucet back on, reaching behind her for the shower gel to soap up. She's covered her arms and legs in vanilla suds and she trails the sponge across her chest, startling when her fingertips catch on her necklace. She'd forgotten she was even wearing it. Unbidden, tears fall from her eyes as the gravity of Castle's betrayal hits her again. Her mom's _murder_. He'd been digging around; the one thing he'd promised not to do. She wants to throw up again but she chokes out a cry, manages to keep herself from retching. As the water runs cold, the tears come.

* * *

**A/N: This multi chapter is a lot less planned out that Overlap was, but it has something in common- titles (chapter and story) are borrowed again from Ani DiFranco songs. Next chapter shouldn't be far away. Many thanks to Ky for the beta, and Kylie for the read through and hints :)**


	2. Don't ask me why I'm crying

Beckett stares at the ceiling, motionless. She considers getting up, maybe reading a bit. But in spite of her many books, she can't bring herself to choose a novel from the shelves. She'll see his name if she does that, she'll scan the shelves, and his name will mock her and… no. She's not even going to think his name. Not right now. Or the name of her alter ego. No. Absolutely not. Nik- no. _His_ _character_ might well have a back story, but that's it. She's done. She wonders idly what strings she would have to pull to stop the book going to print.

Beckett eventually falls into a restless sleep. She tosses and turns, and wakes a few times. At two in the morning the clock on her nightstand is taunting her as she thinks back to her early twenties. She'd lived and breathed her mother's murder at huge personal cost. She thought those days were done, that she was going to be able to live her own life on her own terms, but now Cas- no. She's not going to think his name. Now her _former_ _consultant_ is pulling her back under.

She considers just getting dressed and going in to work. Surely there's paperwork she can do, even if they haven't had a fresh body drop. But the idea of going to the precinct and spending hours alone in the bullpen is even less appealing than spending a sleepless night in her own apartment.

She walks to her kitchen and gulps down a glass of water, just for something to do, and is surprised by how thirsty she is. She shrugs. She hadn't eaten dinner either. She trudges back to her bedroom to try for sleep again.

Finally, just before dawn Kate falls into a deeper sleep, and when she wakes, sunlight is streaming into her bedroom through the open blinds.

"Crap," she exclaims when she sees the time. Ten o'clock. She is way late. She curses under her breath as she swings her legs over the edge of the bed. What happened to her alarm? She grimaces as she realizes- her phone is on the counter in the kitchen instead of charging in her bedroom, and it's off. She sighs; she doesn't even know if the alarm sounds if the phone isn't on; in any case, she didn't hear it.

She charges into the kitchen and powers the phone on. Sure enough, there are voicemails. She dials in and deletes the first one the instant she hears Castle's voice. She's angry at herself when she hears the second one. Dispatch. In all her years as a detective, and an officer before that, Beckett's _never_ missed a call from Dispatch that she hasn't been able to return right away. Crap.

This is not okay. She listens to the next couple of voicemails on speaker as she fumbles around in her closet selecting clothing; black pants, pale blue shirt, and shoes; heels of course, because she needs to feel like Detective Beckett again; right now she feels like the ghost of her nineteen year old self.

She stares at the selection as she listens first to Montgomery. _Beckett, you're needed at the scene_, _where are you?_ Then Esposito. _Yo, Beckett, we're heading out. Meet you there? _Kate dives at her cell phone to delete the next message from Castle, and then it's Montgomery again, sounding mightily pissed off. _Beckett. Get your ass to the crime scene. _Uh-oh.

No time for coffee. And no-one waiting for her at the scene, coffee in hand.

Beckett grabs her piece and rushes out of the apartment; this is the most inelegant she's felt in a long time. Being a detective has always meant being in control for Kate. This morning feels a lot like failing miserably.

* * *

Castle's still cursing his own stupidity when he wakes up the next morning. Ten o'clock. That's late for him these days.

The first thing he does is check his phone, hoping against hope that she'll have called, or texted. He's disappointed but unsurprised to see that there are no new messages or missed calls. He wonders if a body will drop today; if the Captain will try and convince Beckett to take him back for the good of the NYPD's image. He wonders what she'll tell the boys. He wonders what she'll tell Will.

He imagines her crying in her ex-boyfriend's arms, and he feels slightly ill. Then again, that could be the result of the quantity of scotch he downed last night. He runs his hand over his stubble, considering. Drinking last night hadn't been the brightest idea, but apparently he's been making bad decisions all round lately. He'd just wanted to help Beckett. Instead, he'd crossed a line he hadn't known existed, and effectively ruined everything. The pounding in his head seems a small punishment for his recklessness. At least Alexis had spent the night at a friend's place. By the time his daughter gets home he'll have showered, shaved, and put on a brave face.

He sighs. Beckett. He doesn't know what happened after he left her in the bathroom, but he thinks it's safe to assume that Will probably picked up the pieces. Castle grimaces, imagining the scene. Will's arms around Kate, wiping the tears from her face...

He prickles angrily at the thought of- No. It's none of his business. They flirt, sure, he and Beckett, but he's not going to kid himself that it goes any further than a casual repartee and an unrequited physical attraction. There's nothing there, and after this, there never will be. Not with the way he hurt her, and certainly not with Will waiting in the wings, clearly ready to swoop in. Castle's not under any illusions. Beckett might be naive, but there's no way that Will called her in on the kidnapping case for any other reason than to get back with her. And now. Well, the man took a bullet on the job, and if that's not impressive, Castle doesn't know what is.

Castle's cell rings, and he leaps on it, answering without looking at the caller ID. Maybe it's her. Maybe. "Castle."

"Rick. It's Gina." His ex-wife's voice is just a little too loud, and he flinches. Yeah. The scotch last night was not a good idea. A mere shower and Tylenol is not going to cut it.

"Ah… Gina." He takes a deep breath to try and reel himself in. "To what do I owe the pleasure?"

"If you'd check your emails," she starts, "you'd know. Deadlines, Rick. Last chapter?"

"F-" he starts before trailing off. She's the last person he wants to talk to. His ex-wife as his publisher? He must be nuts. "Sure. Almost done," he lies.

"Almost exactly what you said last time," Gina tells him, and he can tell this day is just going to get worse. He should hang up now.

"I'm…" he groans. "Listen, Gina. It's not a good time. Can I- I'll call you later, okay?"

He can practically hear her shake her head, and he knows she's seething. "Nikki, Rick. I need _Nikki_. I don't care what's going on with you-"

That stings more than it should. "I know you don't care, Gina. But you care about sales, so how about you let me do it my way?" He sighs to himself. Because _his _way is so effective. Right. Yeah, Castle. Just push at Beckett until she ends everything; his inspiration and their friendship, gone, just like that. Fabulous plan. Castle shakes his head at his own stupidity.

"Rick," she warns, and he closes his eyes, pressing his fingertips to his temple.

"Gina," he sighs, sorry all of a sudden. He doesn't want to fight with her. "I'm working on it, okay? That's all I have for you right now."

"Sure," she says, and he can't quite read her tone. "But don't be surprised when I call you at the same time tomorrow." She hangs up and Castle makes a mental note to remember not to answer his phone tomorrow. He forces himself to get up, tired legs propelling him of bed. He goes first to the bathroom to relieve himself, writing the shower off as too much effort. He makes his way into the kitchen to make a pot of coffee, and carries his mug back into the office and boots up his computer. He can't promise his best work, and he might hate every second of Gina's nagging, but she's not wrong; he owes her the last chapter.

* * *

Beckett makes it to the crime scene as the body is being loaded up into the coroner's van.

"You're late." Espo's voice booms across the parking lot and she flinches.

"Overslept," she tells him curtly, and he misunderstands and grins.

"Nice," he nods at her, and she scowls.

"Hey, where's Castle?" Ryan asks, coming up behind her.

"Not. Coming," she tells them through clenched teeth. Ryan just frowns, but she sees something give in Esposito's expression, a flash of understanding, perhaps? It's gone before she can analyze it.

Esposito clears his throat. "Right."

Beckett takes a deep breath. "Fill me in on the case," she tells them, her voice devoid of emotion, and Ryan glances at Esposito before nodding at them both.

"Vic was found in the parking lot at seven this morning," he tells her. "White male, early thirties. Has all the hallmarks of a hit and run, but there's no ID on the body- no wallet at all- so we've got uniforms checking that out in case the wallet was taken and dumped somewhere nearby."

"Uh-huh." Beckett nods. "Good." In her pocket she can feel her phone buzzing again and she checks the caller ID before ending the call without answering.

"Castle?" she hears Ryan ask Esposito under his voice, and Esposito frowns at his partner.

"Dude!" he objects, under his breath.

Beckett fixes the two of them with a glare. "Case, guys," she instructs them, but her heart's not in it.

They talk as they walk around the scene- or what's left of it- CSU are pretty close to being done. Most of the evidence has been bagged and the uniforms have scattered to canvas the neighborhood.

Beckett rests her head in her hands for a second when she's alone again in her car, and then pulls her phone out. There's a text from Castle which she deletes without reading. The missed call is more of an issue. Will didn't leave a voicemail, so she doesn't have to listen to yet another recording, but she will have to call him back; she owes him an explanation at the very least.

"_I thought you were over sprinkles."_

"_Maybe not."_

Just yesterday- was it really that recent? She'd been… what? Flirting with Will? Enjoying his apparent jealousy of Castle? Considering getting back together with him? It hadn't quite gone that far, she knows, but it's obvious now that it never will. Not like that, although she has a momentary self-destructive impulse to call him back and see where this can go. She won't though. Not because she doesn't want to- god, she could use the distraction- but because Will deserves so much more than a messy hook up and another inevitable break up.

She bites her lip as she considers.

"_Watch it, Kate. He likes you."_

And Castle. She shakes her head at herself. He'd been her friend, damn it. He'd become her _friend_, and after a rocky start she'd enjoyed every second of the banter that crossed the precarious line of friendship.

It's less than twenty four hours since Castle tore down the walls she'd so carefully constructed to partition her mom's case and her life. Kate feels more alone than she has in years.

* * *

The case ends up being an easy solve. Lanie is able to put time of death at five in the morning and CCTV footage picked up a few cars that could have been involved. She gets a warrant to take a look at the cars, and it's only just past midday when Ryan and Esposito bring in a suspect, picking him up at the garage before he can organize panel beaters to destroy the evidence.

The guy's a mess and he doesn't even try and deny it, handing over the wallet he took from the victim, and professing his guilt before Beckett's even got him in the box. She sighs, offers the man a tissue, ushers him into interrogation, and takes his confession.

Beckett's not sure if she's almost sorry that the case was so clear cut; she's not really in the zone, but she could stand to sink her teeth into something juicy. She stares at the paperwork, taking her time with it and counting down the minutes until she can get out of there.

It's four in the afternoon when Javier brings her a cup of coffee, setting it down on her desk with a nod, and Kate realizes she hasn't said a word to either of the boys since she asked them to take their suspect down to holding; not about Castle, but not about the case either.

"You okay?" Esposito asks, and she regards him through tired eyes.

"Fine," she tells him, biting her lip. "Just fine. Thanks for the coffee." She casts her eyes back to her computer screen, dismissing him. The detective hesitates for a moment before heading back to his own desk and she watches out of the corner of her eye as he and Ryan whisper to one another, Ryan's eyes widen as he glances up at Castle's empty chair. She cuts their speculation short with a look, and they both get back to concentrating on their own computer screens.

* * *

Beckett's shut her computer down and pulled on her jacket when Montgomery calls her into his office at the end of the day.

"Everything okay, Detective?"

"Uh-huh." Kate nods. "Yes, Sir." She looks down at her feet; she's not fooling her Captain, but she's not getting into this now. Not with him, not with anyone.

"Your shadow wasn't here today," he notes.

"No, Sir," she agrees, grimacing.

"Any reason for that, Beckett?"

"No," she tells him, lying through her teeth. Roy considers this, looking at her for a long moment, and she flinches.

Montgomery's eyes narrow. "Okay then," he says at last, dismissing her with a nod. "But I want you in on time tomorrow. Today was an exception, not the rule."

"Of course." Beckett nods, flushing with anger. She's distracted but she needs to pull herself together; the last thing she wants is Montgomery calling her out on her behavior. "It won't happen again."

"It better not," he calls after her as she leaves. Her eyes are stinging but she makes it into the elevator before the tears spill out.

* * *

**A/N: MANY thanks to Kellie. Above and beyond. Seriously. And many thanks to reviewers, followers, and favoriters from the last chapter- hope you like this one! x  
**


	3. Fades like a radio station

Beckett walks home slowly, ruing her decision to not change at the precinct; seven blocks in heels isn't her idea of a good time, but she's not in any hurry to be alone within her four walls.

She toys with the idea of calling Lanie. She could call her friend, maybe they could go out. Dancing? Drinking? She doesn't care. She's on call tomorrow, but since they wrapped up the case today she need only go in if a body drops. But as she continues her trek home, sluggishly placing one foot in front of the other, the idea of collapsing into bed doesn't sound so bad after all. Maybe she'll even sleep; she knows she could use a solid eight hours.

At the thought of how tired she is, she's shocked once more by the conversation that transpired two days ago. She's furious all over again. What was Castle thinking? Beckett freezes abruptly, stilling on the sidewalk. She scowls back at a middle aged man who throws her an angry look as he brushes past her roughly.

Her gaze catches on a child dragging her heels, her mother tugging on her hand. She wishes she remembered more of her own childhood. Wishes she could ask her own mom about the good and the bad. Wishes she could relive it all, do it better this time. Savor it.

Deep breaths, she reminds herself, but there's no peace to be had on this busy New York street. The days are getting longer and warmer, but Beckett pulls her jacket closer around herself, shaking her head and averting her eyes.

She's nearly home; in fact, her apartment is in view, so she continues walking. She will cross the road, walk another hundred yards, and she'll turn into her building. She will take the elevator to her floor, and collapse in a heap once she steps into her apartment. She's forgetting something, though. She pauses at the stop light, waiting impatiently for it to change, before it hits her. Will. She hasn't seen him or returned his calls. Beckett runs a frustrated hand through her hair as the light changes, hesitating.

She doesn't want to see him, doesn't want to explain herself.

Beckett sighs; better to do this now, get it over with. Instead of crossing, she sticks her hand out, hailing a cab instead, and asks the driver to take her to the hospital.

* * *

The cab drops her off a block away from the hospital; she knows it's ridiculous, but she figures one last donut won't hurt. It was always their thing, and she gets a cup of coffee too, draining the cup before she even reaches the hospital entrance. It's the first hit of caffeine that she's had since she'd left Esposito's coffee cold on her desk.

Kate shudders as she steps over the threshold of the hospital, past the nurses smoking on their break, and through the automatic doors, recalling the way she fled two days ago. She steels herself and heads up to Will's room, knocking lightly on his door before letting herself in.

"Hey…" Will's voice is soft, and he struggles to sit up when he sees her, but he smiles broadly. "I missed you."

Kate bites her lip. There's hope in his eyes that makes her uncomfortable. "Hey," she returns, tentatively stepping closer and sitting in the chair beside his bed. She pushes the box with the donut toward him. "I- uh-" She falters, feeling stupid.

"Kate?" Will asks. There's concern in his eyes now, and she grimaces. "You okay?"

She shrugs. "You're- I should be asking you that," she tells him wryly, and he grins.

"You should," he agrees, and in spite of his teasing tone, she flinches. Well. Yeah. She deserves to be berated. He reaches a hand toward her, though, and smiles. "Seriously, Kate? I'm okay- it's you that I'm worried about. What happened? You ducked out of here, and I figured you'd be back- and then one of the nurses told me you ran off crying…"

"You said 'he likes you'," she starts, and Will nods. "Well-" She shrugs again, and it tumbles out. "He's been looking into my mom's case. Behind my back. He- he said he wanted to stop looking, when he realized that I- but-" Beckett swallows angrily, unable to finish that sentence. "But before he could stop, his expert found something. His _expert_," she spits out again, and Will raises his eyebrows.

"He what?" Will's tone is incredulous, and Kate sighs.

"He- he didn't know," she offers, feeling foolish. Now that she can hear the disdain in Will's voice, the anger on her behalf, she feels an irrational need to defend Castle that she tries to suppress. "He didn't know," she shrugs, trying this time for anger, but mostly she's just tired; she feels, among other things, like the last few days have added a decade to her life.

Will shrugs, wincing as he moves, and Kate squeezes her eyes shut. Her ex-boyfriend is in pain; he's been shot, for crying out loud, and the last thing he needs is her unloading on him. She shifts uncomfortably in the hard hospital chair, and looks around the room, needing to look at something other than the pain that passes over his face.

"I shouldn't have come," she says at last, staring steadfastly at the crooked painting on the wall opposite. "I-"

"Hey." Will reaches for Kate, grabbing her wrist before she can get up. "You can tell me stuff, Kate. I'm going to be out of hospital in a few days time, and you know I'm back in the city now. It's going to be okay."

Beckett shakes her head. Does he think they're going to pick up where they left off when he left for Boston? "Will, no. We're… over. We're not going to see each other again… you know that, right?"

He shakes his head. "I thought-" he falls quiet, and Beckett matches his silence with her own. She knows what he thought.

"I know," she says at last, because it's easier to lie. "But…" She bites her lip. "I can't," she says, at last. "I'm not- I'm not the same, Will. Not-" Not the kind of woman he needs. She's too complicated. She hates that Castle is right, that she and Will are too similar; they bring out the worst in each other. They have fun, but they also get competitive. They get caught up in their own cases; they don't operate as partners.

And, when all is said and done, she just doesn't want to get into a relationship. Not right now, and not with Will.

"You know that right?" she asks again, sighing.

He nods at last, and smiles at her ruefully. "It could have been great," he tells her.

She shrugs. "Yeah," she agrees softly, because she has to say something, even if it's untrue.

* * *

She leaves the hospital less angry than when she'd arrived. She feels empty, if anything. She'd made small talk for a few minutes longer, until Will had feigned tiredness with a yawn. She'd gratefully excused herself, walking away from his room with an accompanying feeling of relief.

Beckett makes her way home, jumping on the subway this time, walking up the stairs to her apartment instead of waiting for the elevator. She reaches into her pocket to fumble for her keys, stumbling on the torn carpet at the top of the staircase. Man, she's exhausted. She huffs aloud when her fingers close around the keys, not quite able to believe she'd been entertaining the thought of calling Lanie. She's so tired now, seeing Will has sapped her of the last of her energy, and she thinks she's beyond even caring that Castle-

Castle? There's a familiar figure slouched in her doorway and Beckett grimaces, releasing her hold on her keys and reaching instead for her piece almost automatically. "Castle?" she exclaims, narrowing her eyes. "You need to leave."

She releases her grip on the gun and reaches again for the keys, brushing past him roughly before he's even said a word. She inserts her key into the lock and opens her door. He straightens up, unfurling to his full height, and Beckett straightens her back a little too. She's grateful, suddenly, that she's spent the evening marching around Manhattan in these god-uncomfortable heels.

"Leave, Castle," she tells him, pushing past him and stalking through the door of her apartment. "Just- stay away." She moves to close the door, but she hesitates when he speaks.

"Beckett- wait-" he says, and she sighs.

"Why, Castle? So you can trample on some more of my life? Find a few other wounds to open?"

"No-" There's genuine despair in his eyes, and even in her haze of anger, Beckett recognizes it for what it is. Guilt. "No- just hear me out. I didn't mean to meddle- I got the file, and I started looking-"

"Ah, yes," she spits out. "The file. But here's what I can't figure out. I told you about my Mom, and you took matters into your own hands, you looked through the file. But how? I know you didn't get _my_ copy of it- so who gave you access to the locked archive room? You've been following me around for months, and I know I certainly never let you loose in there."

Castle shakes his head. "It doesn't matter," he tells her, and she shakes her head. It does matter. He's wormed his way into her life, but more than that, he's entrenched himself at the Twelfth to such a point that someone obviously agreed to let him look at evidence. She's livid, now that she thinks about it. Montgomery may not have written her up, back when she was a uniform, but she won't hesitate to do so to whoever let Castle have the file.

"Seriously," she says, pinching the bridge of her nose and closing her eyes as she exhales slowly, counting to three in her head before she opens her eyes again. "Who?"

"I-" Castle shakes his head. "It's not important."

"Come on, I know you didn't just bribe an officer-" she looks at him. "You didn't, did you?"

"No." Castle runs his fingers through his hair, apparently considering, before shaking his head. "Seriously, Beckett. It's not important. Let's say, yeah- I bribed an officer. Let's leave it at that."

Beckett raises her eyebrows at him. "Let's leave it at that, then," she agrees, and shuts the door before he can say another word.

* * *

**A/N: Made it back to this one after my mad dash to get the last fic out before season six began! (And hurrah for Caskett back on our screens, I say!) Trish, thank you for the last minute beta. :) **


	4. We are made to bleed

Beckett leans her head against the door after she closes it on Castle. She's… exhausted. Truly, fully, spent. She kicks off her heels and stumbles into her bedroom, pushing her gun into its drawer. She pulls off her shirt and pants, and collapses onto the bed in her bra and panties; she doesn't want to shower, she doesn't want to eat. She just wants the mess of the whole day to fade away.

Kate squirms under the covers and pulls them tightly over herself; she creates a gap through which she can breathe, tries to hold her eyes open for a second longer, battling with herself and her need to replay just where she went wrong today, but she can't stay awake. Her last thought, before sleep reaches her, is that she misses Castle.

* * *

"Darling, where have you been?" Martha's concerned tone pierces through Castle's slumber, and he forces himself to sit up, pushing his mostly empty glass away in a half-hearted attempt to look respectable. Martha looks pointedly at the glass, and he shrugs, reaching for it again and sipping.

"You're the one who just came home, Mother," he tells her, and she offers a little wave of her hand which has him smirking and glancing at his watch. Midnight. Huh. He hadn't heard Martha come in and judging by the crick in his neck, he thinks he must have drifted off. He rolls his shoulders experimentally; the office chair might be a comfortable stage from which to procrastinate, but it's an appalling place to sleep.

"I may be the one who just came home," Martha tells him, "but I'm not the one who left the apartment at five this evening, walking straight past my mother and my daughter without a word."

Castle flinches. Had he done that? Huh. He hadn't even seen Alexis or his Mother when he'd left, he'd just been struck by the sudden urge to try and make amends with Beckett. "It doesn't matter," he tells her. "It didn't work. She didn't want to talk to me."

"Ah." Martha raises her eyebrows. "So you went to see Beckett."

Castle shrugs, standing and stretching. "I did. For all the good it did me."

"Well, Richard, I hate to say it, but maybe this is how it's meant to be."

Castle glares at his mother. "Thank you, Mother, for that insight."

Martha throws her hands up in the air. "Oh, you know what I mean- I don't mean Beckett not talking to you- although I have to admit, I saw that one coming." She raises her eyebrows knowingly. "No, I mean it's clear that young woman has a lot of demons, and hard as this may be for her, maybe in the long run this will give her a chance to work through it all."

Castle shakes his head. "I don't think so." He reaches again for the glass, swallowing the last of the amber liquid and replacing the glass on his desk. He shrugs, and turns to leave, heading toward his bedroom. He pauses when he gets to the doorway, and turns back. His mother is still standing in his office, staring after him. "She went through a year of therapy to put this to rest," he says. "So no, I can't agree- I've opened old wounds, and I don't think she'll ever forgive me."

* * *

"What about _Nikki_?"

His daughter's question comes out of the blue, and Castle turns to her sharply.

"What about _Nikki_?"

Alexis shrugs and swallows down another mouthful of cereal before she answers. "I just meant- if you're not following Detective Beckett around anymore, what are you going to do about _Nikki_?"

Castle narrows his eyes at his daughter. He's ninety-nine percent sure she's asking innocently, but her wide eyes are just a little too guileless to convince him completely. "I'm-" He's at a loss, and he shrugs, pouring himself a coffee while he considers. "I'm going to finish it, and, well, we'll see." He can't very well not finish it, not with Gina on his case; besides, he's signed a contract, and he intends to fulfill it.

Alexis smiles sweetly up at him, reaching for the coffee before he can replace the pot and filling her own mug. "Okay," she says. "So- you won't be killing her off, like you did _Derrick_?"

Castle half curses under his breath, before he catches himself; he makes a point of setting an example for his daughter, at least as far as language is concerned. "No," he chokes out, coughing as his sip of coffee goes down the wrong way. "What is this is about, Alexis?"

Alexis shrugs, but she's no longer meeting his eyes. "It's just- this is what you do, Dad. You get bored, and you move on." She shrugs and smiles weakly, but when her blue eyes finally meet his own, all mirth is gone.

"I don't-" He scratches his head, considering. She's not entirely wrong. She's not completely right either, and for the first time he wonders if he's been doing the right thing, working so hard on shielding Alexis from the more difficult moments in his life. "I don't just move on," he tells her at last. "I wrote _Derrick_ for years- _years_, Alexis. Longer than I should have."

"So why didn't you stop sooner?" she asks. He watches her as she sips her coffee cautiously, screwing up her nose at the bitter flavor. She looks and sounds so young, all of a sudden, younger than her fourteen years. "If you should have stopped earlier?"

"I- uh…" Castle trails off. Because Gina wanted him to write _Derrick_. Because he'd tried to save his marriage. Because he liked the income _Derrick_ generated, because he liked that he could afford to enroll his daughter at an exclusive school. Because it was all he knew. Because he was afraid of doing something new, starting fresh. "Because I didn't know anything else, until I realized I couldn't live a lie anymore," he says instead, cupping his daughter's face in his hand.

She smiles up at him and ducks her head away, pushing her half empty cereal bowl away and standing up. "Then I think you should keep writing _Nikki_, Dad. Since you care about her so much." Alexis dumps her bowl in the sink and walks away toward the stairs and he watches her go. He doesn't know if she's talking about _Nikki_ or Kate.

* * *

Kate stretches as she wakes up. She can't tell if she feels better or worse, but a glance at her wristwatch tells her she got a full eight hours, so mostly she's just grateful. She sighs; no messages on her phone this morning, from dispatch or otherwise, and there's a funny sinking feeling in her stomach. She usually loves the solace of her apartment but lately it's stifling and she feels lonely.

She shrugs into a robe and makes herself a coffee in the kitchen, leaning heavily against the counter with a sigh. She's out of creamer, so she drinks it black; whether or not she goes into the precinct today there won't be anyone there to bring her a decent cup, so she swallows the last of this one down and heads back into her bedroom to get dressed, make a start on the day.

There's a funny emptiness competing with the ache in her head; a buzzing void, and with another sigh, Kate pulls on jeans and a sweater and shrugs, almost in resignation as she opens her closet, climbing on the armchair beside her bed to reach to the top shelf.

She reaches for the box that's balanced precariously on top of her warmest winter jackets and lifts it down gingerly. She carries it all the way back into the living room before she opens it, shaking her head even as she does so. This feels every bit the mistake but she has the odd feeling that events have been set in motion. She feels helpless to stop herself.

The carton is dusty, and she sweeps the top with her hand before she opens it, both reluctant and eager to see what's inside.

The contents haven't changed and Kate breathes in sharply when she sees the photograph at the top; the image is seared in her brain, but the shock of seeing the crime scene picture of her mother slumped in the alley is still enough to make her squeeze her eyes shut for a moment before opening them and forcing herself to delve into the box.

She lays it all out on the coffee table before her; how many times did she look at this during her first few years on the force? She wonders why she still has all this; she'd seen a therapist for a full year, put the case aside when she realized there was no way through the investigation. And now Castle. Beckett closes her eyes again, leaning back into the sofa cushions.

He'd been so sure they could solve this, and she shakes her head at his arrogance; one of things she's secretly appreciated about Castle, for the whole time she's known him, is just how willing he is to push the envelope. The counter balance, though, is that he's accustomed to using his money to open doors, influence people, and push for privileges.

She shrugs again, pushing the box and its contents aside and reaching for her phone. Staying in and looking at this isn't doing her any favors and she's determined that she won't get lost in it. She opens her contacts list and texts Lanie. It's still too early to call her friend for something that's not work related, but it's not too early to text and make plans for later. Kate types the message out and presses send. _Drinks tonight? I'm buying._

* * *

Castle rifles through the case file for the hundredth time, slumping down in his chair. He's sorry that he'd brought it back up, hurting Beckett in the process, but he's sick of being swamped with guilt. He'd made a mistake, but that was all it was. His intentions had been pure but he hates that he went into this telling Beckett that he had the resources to help; money wasn't going to solve this, and his bravado had been misplaced.

He sits up straighter, finding a new determination as he flicks through the crime scene photographs. He spreads the pictures of Johanna Beckett across the desk; seeing Beckett's mother's face staring up at him strengthens his resolve. Beckett may not want him to investigate, but he's already come further than she did and he can't stop now.

He opens the thin file Dr. Murray had left with him. He doesn't have much; three names and a verbal assurance that they were killed by the same person who killed Kate's mother. He wonders how he can get their files. He's probably not going to be able to get past Esposito this time; he'd be surprised if either of the boys are talking to him, and he has no interest in going up against Montgomery. No, he needs someone else, preferably someone who doesn't know the ins and outs of his relationship with Beckett.

Castle stretches out and stands up, considering. He's got a shot with Ryan if it comes down to it, but it would be better to approach one of the other Detectives; he's chatted with Karpowski a half dozen times in the break room. Smiling with the relief of having a plan at last, Castle strides into his bedroom and through to the bathroom, humming as he showers and pulls on some clothes. He's going to the precinct, Kate's unspoken edict that he stay away be damned.

* * *

**A/N: Thanks for reading- reviews would make my day! A promise- Beckett and Castle will be back in the same room as one another soon! Many thanks for the read through Kylie!  
**


	5. Savoring the same old dream

Castle hesitates when the elevator doors opens, but he steps onto the homicide floor before the doors can close on him. A cautious glance at Beckett's desk tells him she's not in. Her computer's off, and there's no tell-tale cup of coffee, so he figures he's safe, for now.

"Castle!" The Captain's booming voice catches him by surprise and he whirls around; Montgomery is coming out of his office, a smile on his face.

"Roy!" At a loss for what else to do, Castle beams at Montgomery, hoping his presence here without Beckett won't be questioned. Montgomery, though, just gives him a wave and heads toward interrogation. Castle lets out a breath he hadn't known he was holding, and relaxes a little.

He's not out of the woods yet. He spots the boys at their desks; they both sit up straight when they hear Montgomery call out to him and Esposito stands up, nodding at Ryan who follows his colleague's action. The two men crowd around Castle, and he's pleased to see there's no animosity on either of their faces. Huh. This might just be easier than he thought.

"Castle." Ryan speaks up before Esposito can. "What's going on with Beckett?"

Castle shrugs. He's going to have to play this cool. Beckett obviously hasn't told them what he did, and he's not going to either. Not yet, that's for sure. "I don't know. Last I knew, she'd gone to see Will in hospital. Why?" It's low, he knows, to bring Beckett's ex-boyfriend into this, lump the blame onto the other man for whatever is going on with Beckett, but he's going to fix this. He is.

Esposito fixes Castle with a piercing stare but Castle meets his eyes and the shorter man shrugs and looks away, glancing over at Beckett's empty desk. "She was pretty quiet yesterday, man," Esposito tells Castle, and Ryan nods in agreement.

"And you weren't here- we thought you might have done something," Ryan adds.

Castle throws his hands into the air in pretense of innocence. "Hey, no. No. I didn't do anything." The lies seem to work, and he sees the tension ease off Esposito's face.

He winces, though, as Esposito turns to Ryan with a glare. "Sorenson."

"Sorenson," Ryan nods, before turning back to Castle. "But- what happened with Sorenson. I mean- last we heard she was visiting him at his sick bed- what went wrong?"

"Pretty obvious, isn't it?" Esposito shakes his head at his partner. "He made a move- Beckett must have turned him down."

Ryan nods, as if it all makes sense, and Castle finds himself nodding along, barely able to keep pace with the turns this conversation is taking. Not only do the boys not realize he's to blame for a difficult Beckett yesterday, they're happy to point the finger at Sorenson.

Castle's not thrilled that the other man is taking the blame, of course, but he needs the file, and that means getting in and out of here with as little fuss as possible. He promises himself that he'll clear the air later. His plan isn't as fleshed out as it might be; in fact, he's written short stories with more direction than this, but deep down, he's hoping that if he can bring more evidence to light he might be able to change Beckett's mind.

And his best case scenario is that he solves the whole damn thing before Beckett even knows he's investigating. He sighs. Even his more arrogant side isn't quite able to believe that he'll able to manage it without getting Kate involved.

Esposito's desk phone rings and he steps aside to take it, leaving Castle staring uncomfortably at Ryan. That had all gone better than he'd thought, and for a moment he considers chancing it and asking Ryan to let him into Archives, but then Esposito's grabbing his jacket and nodding at Ryan. "Body drop uptown," he nods at the two of them. In one swift movement Ryan reaches for his own jacket and cell phone.

"You in?" he asks Castle, and Castle shakes his head.

"No- I, uh- I just came by to…" he trails off when he realizes the two detectives are already walking to the elevator; they're not listening and he waves half-heartedly at them, watching them go.

* * *

Castle stands at Beckett's desk. He traces a fingertip across one of the elephants before absently reaching a hand out and resting it on the back of his seat. He leans against it awkwardly as he considers his next step. At least she hasn't gotten rid of the chair yet. Just as he's wondering how long his luck will hold; how long he'll be able to stand awkwardly like this in the precinct before _someone_ gets wind of the fact he's not welcome here anymore, he sees Karpowski trudging from interrogation toward the break room.

He smiles in relief at catching another break, and hot-foots it across the bullpen to beat her to the coffee machine. By the time she's eased herself into the room, he's already twisted the portafilter into the machine. "Can I make you one?" he asks innocently, pulling two cups down, and Karpowski glances at him, perhaps registering his presence for the first time.

"Oh, hey Castle," she says, smiling in his direction. "Please." She sinks onto the sofa and he smiles at her sympathetically.

"Tough case?" he asks, and she nods. Her hair is escaping its lose bun and he can see the frustration in her eyes.

"You know it," she agrees, and he nods back. "If my guy would just give it up I could go home," she tells Castle. "Uniforms picked him up at two this morning- I've been here since three."

Castle glances at his watch. It's past midday already, and he knows how these things work; she'll be able to toss the guy into holding, but the case won't really be over until she gets a confession. In her own way, he thinks Karpowski is as determined as Beckett and he doesn't think she'll voluntarily go home until she can put it to rest.

"What are you doing here without Beckett?" Karpowski asks him, and he's ready with something that's not even an outright lie, just a patchy statement lazy with half-truth.

"She's on call today," he says honestly. "And I just needed to pick something up. But- uh- actually- I kind of forgot that Beckett wasn't going to be here."

He offers a small smile, and the tired detective smiles back up at him as he hands her a latte before turning back to the machine to make one for himself. He hopes he got it right; this is what he makes for Beckett, but he actually has no idea what anyone else around here prefers.

Castle plunges on; if this doesn't work he's not sure of his next move, but as Karpowski sips her coffee he sees the tension fall away from her face, so he takes his chance. "Actually- since she's not here- there was actually a case I needed to look at in Archives. Do you think you could help me out?"

She nods. "Sure. Let me finish my coffee first, okay, and I can take you down there. You got the case file number and everything?"

"Uh- yeah." Castle nods, glancing through the window into the bullpen. As long as the boys don't make a reappearance before he and Karpowski down their lattes, he's home free.

* * *

"Got them?" Karpowski waiting by the door, watching as he shuffles through the boxes.

"Yeah," Castle grunts, as he reaches for the top shelf to pull the last one down. He's thumbing through a box from May 1999 and Karpowski steps closer and leans against the shelving, picking up the other two cases.

"Diane Cavanaugh and Scott Murray. Who are they?"

Castle shakes his head. "I don't know," he says truthfully. "I'm doing some research and I was told these cases would be useful."

"Mmm," Karpowski hums noncommittally, and he can tell she doesn't really care; she's just making small talk. In fact, when he glances at her, he can tell that she's itching to get back upstairs and into interrogation. The coffee has done its trick and the bone tiredness has lifted from her features.

"A-ha!" Castle exclaims, pulling Jennifer Stewart's file from the last box, and Karpowski reaches over and takes it from him, neatly stacking it on top of the other two cases, while Castle stretches up and replaces the box onto the shelf.

Karpowski hands him the files and he smiles at her gratefully. "Thanks," he tells her, and she gives him a half smile back, ushering him out of the door and locking it behind them.

They step into the elevator together wordlessly, and when it stops to let Castle off at street level she waves at him, and continues on, back up to the Homicide Floor.

"Thanks," he says again.

"Don't mention it," she tells him, and he smiles and nods. He won't mention it, that's for sure. He just hopes she won't either.

* * *

After the quiet of her apartment, the thrum of the bar is a relief, and Beckett feels the tension leave her body as she melts into the crowd. She closes her eyes briefly to appreciate the steady beat coming from the DJ opposite the bar before opening them again to look around for Lanie. She's running late, and she's sure Lanie is waiting for her.

Kate wrinkles her nose. No calls out to a crime scene has meant she's spent the entire day in solitude and she'd reluctantly shoved the box with her Mom's file under her bed sometime in the afternoon. She's done with the case. She _is_, she tells herself, and she pushes the thought away when she sees Lanie waving to her from across the room.

"Hey, Girl." Lanie looks Kate up and down appraisingly, and she blushes. What better way to get the day out of her system than by dressing to impress? So, her dress is both short and low cut; she figures she can use the confidence boost, and maybe she'll get a couple of drinks out of showing this much leg.

"Hey, Lanie." Kate leans in to squeeze her friend's arm with a wry smile.

"Girl, what's going on with you?" Beckett ducks her head and avoided Lanie's eyes. Typical Lanie, starting in with the hard questions.

She shrugs. "I don't know what you mean. There's nothing going on with me."

"Uh-huh." Lanie fixes Beckett with a look that lets the detective know that she hasn't fooled her friend for a second, but she lets it go and takes her by the hand, leading her to the bar. "What are you buying?"

Beckett smirks, and leans over the bar, raising her voice to order two vodka martinis. She hands over her credit card with the intention of opening a tab, and takes the two martinis in exchange, carrying them away from her body as she follows Lanie, weaving through the crowd.

The two women find a corner that's a little quieter than the rest of the place, and Beckett stares absently at the throng on the dance floor as she sips her drink. She can feel Lanie's eyes on her, and she braces herself for the questions she knows are coming.

Lanie surprises her though. "I spoke to Javi today," she says, and Kate hides a grin. _Javi_. Yeah. If Lanie thinks she's hiding the fact she has feelings for the Hispanic detective, Kate has news for her.

"Uh-huh," she nods, plucking the olive from the drink and pulling it from the toothpick before popping it into her mouth.

"Mmm-hmm." Lanie fixes Kate with a look that has her sitting back in surprise. "He said Castle came by the precinct today," she tells her friend, an appraising look in her eyes, and Kate startles, swallowing the olive in surprise.

"He-" She shakes her head. No. She's not going to play it cool. She's furious, and she's not going to hide it from Lanie. "I'm done Lanie. I'm done with him- the shadowing, the book, the man. Everything."

"Hey!" Lanie holds a hand up in protest. "Hey, I'm just-" She stops suddenly, narrowing her eyes at Beckett. "So- this… _mood_ is because of _Castle_? Because Javi told me that Castle said-" She stops again off Kate's look.

Kate shrugs and swallows the rest of her martini down in a smooth motion. Lanie rolls her eyes, a patented move that she's picked up from Kate, and follows suit with a slight shake of her head.

There's an uncomfortable pause, and Beckett finds herself scanning the bar, her eyes darting until they finally meet Lanie's again.

"Did he tell Javi what he'd done? Why I was so upset?" Kate's voice is low, and Lanie has to lean in to hear her.

"I- we kind of thought it had something to do with Will. I mean, last Castle heard, you'd gone to see Will in hospital?"

Kate shakes her head, sighing. "No, last Castle heard, I shut the door in his face. Last night, in fact," she grimaces.

"What?" Confusion is painted all over Lanie's face and Kate almost feels sorry for her. "_Why_?"

Kate speaks through clenched teeth. "He's been looking into my mother's case," she tells Lanie, and she watches the shock roll over her face.

"Oooh." Lanie exhales heavily her eyes wide. "Girl, we are going to _talk_ about this. But first I'm gonna get us another drink, okay?" She pats Beckett on the hand before making a beeline for the bar, and Kate watches her go, a sad huff of laughter escaping her own lips.

* * *

Kate makes her way out of the cab unsteadily. She'd insisted she was fine, and she'd managed to fool Lanie, but she's no longer fooling herself and she weaves across the pavement and into the building. She nods at the doorman who smiles at her and calls the elevator down.

She leans her head against the mirrored interior; she can't see anything but her own reflection and it's disturbing, a disproportionate number of Becketts glaring back at her from every angle.

The elevator doors open with a soft ding and she steps into the dimly lit hallway, marching forward with a determination she's not sure she feels anymore, and she pounds on the heavy door in front of her.

The door swings open slowly almost at once, and she's mortified to see Martha in front of her. The older red head just stands aside and beckons Kate in.

"Martha," she mumbles, and Castle's mother smiles sympathetically at her. _She knows_, Kate realizes with a grimace and she shrugs past the woman, finding herself standing impotently in the entrance.

Martha leans in to give her a light kiss on her cheek and she stiffens but accepts it. "He's in his office- you can go on in," Martha tells her with a nod of her head toward the study.

The reality of being in the loft has sobered Kate up quickly, and she's left with a dull thud of fear pounding in her chest as she steps through the doorway into Castle's office, watching him flick through papers on his desk.

This already feels less and less like a good idea, but Beckett propels herself forward. Lanie had told her to _talk_ to Castle; but she hadn't exactly said _now_. In fact, Lanie had suggested taking a week to cool off; she'd gone so far as to insinuate Beckett could benefit from taking a few of her vacation days and getting out of town, before she thought about approaching Castle.

Kate sighs. She's here now, and she raises a hand to knock on the open door.

* * *

**A/N: Thanks for reading, and thanks for the quick read through, Kylie! x **

**I thought I'd get them into the same room this chapter, but it got long... soon! x**


	6. Like reckless driving when we're talking

"Beckett!" Castle jumps when he sees Kate standing in his doorway, apparently lost in thought. He's at his desk, anxiously sorting through the files he took from the precinct today and he gathers them together hurriedly. He tucks them into a desk drawer that's out of sight and looks back up at her; his muse, standing there, looking a hell of a lot younger than usual, the bereft expression on her face sending a rush of sympathy through him.

She looks at him, and her expression changes, a rage of emotion threatening a flood of anger.

"Did the boys- are you okay?"

"Okay?" she asks. "_Okay_? No, Castle. I am not _okay_." She's seething, and the words hiss out from between clenched teeth. "You've been running amok in my life as though it's nothing more than a game to you- and now I find out that you've been at the precinct, doing god knows what!"

"You got called in, huh?" he asks and she shakes her head.

"What? No. I saw Lanie."

"Oh." He'd thought the boys would have called Kate in to the scene they went to, but maybe not. Maybe it was a clear cut pop and drop. Or a suicide. Or- He breaks from that train of thought with a shake of his head, taking in her outfit for the first time. Damn. She may look tired, but she looks _good_ and he realizes that, dressed like this, and having seen Lanie, means she's been out with her friend. And he guesses her determination in coming here tonight is probably fueled by liquid courage; there's an erratic look in her eyes that makes him uncomfortable.

"Lanie told me to talk to you." He makes a mental note to thank Lanie but the next words that come out of Beckett's mouth have him rethinking this plan. "But what if I don't want to talk? What if I don't want to know? Did you ever think of that? What if I'm not ready? You dredged up my past for you, Castle. Not for me. And you're too selfish to even see it."

He looks at her in despair, wanting so badly to make this right. "Beckett, I -"

"No," she interrupts him sharply. "You're like a child playing with scissors. You have no idea what you're doing. What you're starting."

Castle shakes his head sadly, and stands up, moving around the desk toward Beckett, but she holds a hand up, the glare on her face stopping him from coming any closer. "I'm not playing, Beckett," is all he says, and her facade starts to crumble; he thinks he sees the shine of unshed tears in her eyes before she turns and runs from the apartment, pushing past his stunned mother who has been not so subtly lingering on the other side of the open office shelving.

"Damn," he sighs as the door slams behind her and he sags against the armchair in the living room. Martha shifts onto the sofa opposite.

"Well, kiddo," she says. "Do you want to tell me what that was all about?"

Castle can only shrug; he realizes it's gone well past midnight, and while he'd rather Martha hadn't witnessed the exchange, he's relieved that at least Alexis had gone to bed hours ago. The urge to protect Beckett is strong, and he doesn't want his daughter to see her that out of control. "I don't know," he tells Martha. "She didn't really stay long enough for me to find out."

His mother shakes her head at him. "No, Richard. I don't buy it. What's this about you going into the precinct? Hasn't that young woman made it clear that she needs some space?"

"Mother! Just last night you were telling me she would come round. Besides- she's the one who came here tonight!"

"Richard, really. You've hurt her, any fool can see that. No, this won't be an easy fix."

"I don't want easy," he tells her, sinking into the armchair and burying his head in his hands. "But I do want to fix it, and I'm not sure I know how. You heard right, though. I did go into the precinct today."

"Whatever for?"

Castle hesitates, wondering how much he should tell his mother before deciding. "I went to get the other files. The ones Dr. Murray told me about."

"Oh, Richard! Do you really think that was a good idea?"

"Less and less every moment," he admits, but Martha isn't done.

"This isn't one of your stories. You can't just ride in on your white horse and save someone who doesn't want rescuing. And you can't think for a second that you'll be able to solve this on your own."

"I know people," he defends, but his heart isn't in it. He shrugs, resigned. He doesn't want to do this anymore, no matter how much he justifies otherwise. "I've know the names of the other victims, and I've worked out that there are connections. One of them was a former law student of Kate's mom, another one, a documents clerk, the third one, a lawyer for a non-profit. But I'm no closer to working out what happened, why they were silenced. If she would just talk to me, I know we could work it out. I _know_ we could."

"You need a better strategy than this going behind her back," his mother declares and he grimaces at her.

"I need a way through her wall, that's for sure," he agrees. "A ladder. Or a door. Or a hole." Castle stands up again. "I'm going to give this up," he says. "You're right. She's right. I can't solve this, and I was looking into it for the wrong reasons. I'm going to stay away for a while. Give her some space. Take a break, and try talking to her again after I give her some distance."

"I agree that would be wise," Martha nods, and Castle smiles ruefully, turning to go to bed.

"Good night, Mother."

* * *

Beckett wakes to a pounding head and the drone of her alarm. She goes to shut the shrill tone off, perhaps set it to snooze, but she catches herself in time. Not her alarm; her cell phone, and dispatch is on the line.

She takes the call and blinks the sleep away, rolling out of bed and swallowing down the last of the water that's on her nightstand before hurrying into the bathroom; every instinct in her body screams at her to slow down, go back to bed, but there's a body, and she's not going to be late today.

No, she decides, as she slides behind the wheel of her cruiser in record time, she's not going to let this thing with Castle beat her. He's the one that messed up. She was fine before he came along, and she's going to be fine again. She turns the music up then winces, turning it off again.

She shuffles around in her purse and then her glove compartment, coming up triumphant with some Advil while she's stopped at a red, and she swallows a couple of pills, willing the headache away. It's not the true headache of a severe hangover, just the shadow of too little sleep, too many drinks, and not just a little shame at her own behavior.

Kate runs her hand through her hair. She doesn't know why she thought going to see Castle would be a good idea. It certainly doesn't feel like it was a smart move this morning. Though, she muses, it could have been worse. As she replays the conversation in her head, she's starting to consider taking Lanie's advice. Maybe she will use some of those vacation days she has stored up once she's wrapped this case.

She pulls up at the scene, and from her car she can't see Esposito or Ryan yet. She is struck, though, by a funny sense of familiarity as she approaches the body and a chill runs down her spine; Perlmutter is hunched over a dark haired woman, who is slumped against the wall of an alley.

She blinks as she realizes the woman is posed similarly to the way her mother had been found, and she sighs, shaking her head. It's a creepy coincidence, nothing more.

"Yo, Beckett." She whirls around, still on edge to see Esposito striding toward her. "Just spoke to Perlmutter. Stabbing."

The words are harsh to her ears, and Beckett closes her eyes briefly, before snapping back to business. "Do we have an ID?"

"Yeah. Kristina Sokolova. A stripper at one of the clubs nearby, we're trying to track down her last place of employment. Witness heard yelling from around the corner, but before he got close enough to see anything, the perp was already running away."

"We get a description?"

"Better," Ryan speaks from behind her. "We got him on CCTV footage from the jewelry store around the corner, and we got the weapon- he dropped his knife a block away so we're running down prints now."

"Good," Beckett says, more to herself than to the boys; this is sounding more and more like a random mugging, or maybe the victim knew her attacker. Either way, if the perp was caught on tape and dropped evidence, it doesn't have any of the hallmarks of a professional hit, and she breathes a little easier, smiling at Esposito and Ryan before excusing herself to go and speak with Perlmutter.

* * *

Castle's determined to put some distance between himself and Beckett. He takes the files from the drawer he'd shoved them in last night and carries them through his bedroom into the closet.

He deftly slides open the inner door and opens the safe set into the wall of the hidden storage room. At best, he likes to think of this room as his secret lair, but it's really a glorified second closet.

And a dusty one, at that, he thinks; sneezing. He'll have to change that though, taking a second glance around the small space; he thinks that he and Alexis really could utilize this space more in their laser tag battles.

Castle places the documents neatly below the other paperwork stacked in the safe. He's still counting his blessings that Beckett hadn't seen what he'd been looking at when she'd come by last night.

He figures Beckett will come round at some point, but he's not holding his breath that it will be anytime soon. He's not going to investigate anymore, at least not until he has her okay, and he's woken up determined to make things right, but he's not going to rush it. He sees her late night visit as a positive sign, though; she can obviously stand to see him, and he hopes they'll make it back to more pleasant terms eventually.

"Well, you're in a good mood," Martha chirps at him from the kitchen, and he smiles at the familiar figures in the kitchen.

"Today is a brand new day," he tells her, beaming at the back of Alexis' head. "Morning, sweetie," he addresses her, and she spins around, pausing in her search of the fridge.

"Morning," his daughter smiles back at him. "Do we have anymore juice?"

He wrinkles his nose. "I finished it last night," he tells her, and she shrugs and reaches instead for the coffee machine, setting it for two lattes. She hands him one and he takes it gratefully.

"So what's your plan for this brand new day of yours?" his mother asks, and Castle considers.

"You know what? I have to write- Gina left another voicemail yesterday and I think I'd better actually get on to that book."

"I'm glad," Alexis tells him, and he smiles, remembering her anxiety yesterday.

"I'm not going to quit, I promise, Pumpkin," he assures her again, and she beams back at him. "But I am going to go to the Hamptons for a few days," he continues, and Martha nods at him encouragingly. "Take a break, get some air, you know?"

Alexis takes sip of the drink she's made for herself before setting the mug aside and grabbing her book bag. "When?" she asks. "Today? Or on the weekend?"

Castle shifts his weight from one foot to the other, deciding. "Tomorrow," he says at last. "And maybe you can come up on the weekend. If you want?"

"Sure," the younger red-head agrees, leaning in to kiss him on the cheek and darting toward the door. "Sounds good," she calls, before slamming the door shut behind her, and Castle is left alone with his mother.

"Take a break, get some air, hide from Beckett," Martha trills, and he shrugs.

"Something like that," he admits, picking up the coffee mug and swallowing the last of it, before heading back to his bedroom; time to get dressed. He needs out of these four walls, and he knows just the place; he'd written portions of his earlier novels all over New York City. It's too early for the Old Haunt, but it's not too early to grab his laptop and situate himself on a cozy sofa in his favorite midtown cafe.

* * *

Ryan's been shooting her sympathetic looks all day, and if he thinks she's not noticing, he's not the detective she thought he was. She's _this _close to sending him out to canvass some more; never mind that they are just waiting on warrants.

Beckett's managed to shake the sense of familiarity that had come over her in the alley and she's more and more convinced every second that this has nothing to do with her mother's case. It's just dumb luck, and probably not even something she would have noticed if she hadn't been so wound up about Castle looking into her mom's case.

On paper the case is all wrapped up. They'd tracked down the victim's next of kin, her place of employment, her roommate, and everyone had said the same thing; Kristina's boyfriend was bad news. Better news, though, is that his prints are a match to the prints on the weapon, and the witness statement and blurry CCTV footage fit with his DMV picture.

She's shuffling through her desk, looking for the granola bar she _knows_ is there. She's about to give it up as a bad idea and go heat up some leftovers in the break room, because she's suddenly starving, but then her hand closes over the snack and she gratefully pulls it out from beneath the knick-knacks that she keeps in her top drawer.

She tears the wrapper off and bites into it; it's no steak, but it's a start. She glances up at the boys to find not just Ryan, but Esposito staring at her, identical looks of shock on their faces. "What?" she snaps.

The guys exchange a glance, but it's Esposito who finds his voice first. "Robbery in SoHo," he says in a low voice, and she stares at him in confusion.

"So? Since when do we care about robberies in SoHo when we're waiting on a warrant for an actual _homicide_?"

It's Ryan who replies, his voice low and serious. "Since it's Castle's place."

* * *

**A/N: Borrowed a couple of lines from 2.01 for this one ;) Many thanks to Trish and Kylie for giving it a going over!**


	7. I'm tired of being so fierce

Beckett's standing before the words are even out of Ryan's mouth, discarding the last of her granola bar into the trash and grabbing the jacket that's on the back of her chair. Ryan and Esposito are hot on her heels and the three of them pile into the elevator.

Her mind is a knot of tension and she forces herself to take a deep breath. "What do we know?" she asks, and Ryan shakes his head.

"Not much- but no-one's been hurt. They're trying to get in touch with Castle now."

* * *

When they make it to Castle's loft they find a distraught Martha giving her statement to a couple of uniforms, and they earn themselves a glare from the robbery detective on the scene. "It's not a homicide," Detective Wilson tells them, and Beckett shrugs.

"No- but it's our civilian consultant's place," Ryan speaks up when it becomes apparent that Beckett's not going to do anything but observe the scene; her lips are tightly drawn and she's scanning the open room.

She steps away from the boys and makes a beeline for Martha, sitting down beside the woman and nodding at the uniforms. "What happened?" she asks, and the older red-head turns to her, distress in her eyes.

"I was upstairs," she says, "when I heard a noise down here. At first I thought Richard was back, so I wasn't at all concerned, but when I came downstairs-" Martha pauses with a wry look on her face- "well, Richard certainly wasn't here, and it looked like this." She gestures through the open study door- there are papers strewn around and a ton of books have been knocked from the shelves.

"How did they get in?" Beckett asks the uniforms grimly, taking note of their names. Clyde and Summers.

"Through the terrace, we think," Summers tells her, and the other Officer nods.

"Probably got to the terrace from the roof," Clyde says. "We've got someone downstairs talking to the doorman now."

Beckett nods, glancing again at the mess in the study before turning back to Martha, when a tall figure storms into the room. Castle wraps his mother up in a hug, and Beckett looks away uncomfortably. She'd forgotten, in her haste to get here, that being at the loft would mean seeing Castle.

"Beckett," Castle says, turning to her with a note of desperation in his voice.

"Castle," she returns, but she doesn't initiate any other conversation, and they stare unhappily at each other for a second before she looks away, avoiding his eyes.

"Thanks… for coming," he starts, but before things can become more awkward, Ryan joins them, looking at them both appraisingly before shrugging and interrupting.

"Castle, hi. Is anything missing?" he asks, and Castle looks around, eyes wide and uncertain.

"I- uh- I don't know. I just got here, so… maybe? But I haven't had a chance to look."

"Doesn't look like there are any prints," Ryan says, and Beckett grimaces. "Professional job, by the looks of it-" It's obvious Castle's not really listening, he's wandered into the study, and Beckett casts a glance at Martha. The older woman looks flustered, and she trails after her son.

Ryan cocks his head after the two of them, indicating that he and Beckett should follow, and she does so reluctantly. She shouldn't have come here. She leans against the doorway between the office and the living room, sighing; she'd been right here just last night, albeit in very different circumstances. It's one thing to put her anger aside and work a case that involves Castle, but she's homicide, not robbery, and she's not needed here.

As if in answer to her prayers, her cell chimes, and she looks at the message from the precinct. "Our warrant's in for the boyfriend," she tells Ryan, and he nods.

It's Castle who surprises her though. He turns to look at her. "Caught a case, did you?" There's a gravity to his voice that takes her by surprise.

She just nods, and turns to go. It's all too raw; just two days ago he would have been with her on the murder investigation, and it's with a heavy heart that she leaves. She can't stay, but she doesn't want to go, either.

Esposito's been hovering around the lead from the Robbery division, but he follows her out the door.

"I'm going to stay here," Ryan calls after them, and she waves a hand behind her, kicking herself for not being polite enough to give a proper goodbye to Martha, but the loft is suffocating.

"You wanna tell me what's going on, Beckett?" Esposito asks her as they ride the elevator downstairs and she stares at him for a moment, considering. His eyes are devoid of any of the gentle ribbing they so often have for each other, and she can only read concern in his expression. "This- thing with you- it's not about Sorenson, is it?"

"No," she agrees, deciding to tell him. She'll keep it matter of fact, she's not going to elaborate. "Castle- Castle's been looking into my mom's case behind my back."

"Oh." Esposito's mouth hangs open a moment too long, and she thinks he's shocked. She nods, clenching her teeth. Yeah. She was stunned too.

* * *

Castle feels a weight lift when he sees Beckett exit with Esposito, but he turns around to find himself face to face with Ryan. "It was you, not Sorenson, who upset Beckett," Ryan accuses, and Castle acquiesces with a curt nod.

"I started looking into her Mom's case behind her back," he confesses and he watches in shame as the Detective's eyes widen. He pushes it aside though; the feeling of violation of having an intruder in the loft is oppressive and he has a sinking feeling in his stomach. He's missing something, he's sure of it. He's perplexed by the entire situation. Why would anyone go to all this effort to break in and not take anything?

And then it occurs to him. The safe. There's only one thing that's new to the loft in the last forty-eight hours.

"I have a safe," he tells Ryan.

"What?"

Castle turns sharply, and Ryan follows him into his bedroom. A few drawers in his dresser are ajar and the closet door is wide open. He points. "In there. There's a second door, and the safe is behind it." Ryan nods, beckoning to the Robbery Detective.

"Wilson?" Ryan calls out, and the other detective joins them.

"I'll get CSU to check it for prints, then you can open it and confirm nothing's missing," he says.

Ryan hovers a little longer, but he doesn't say another word to Castle. It's a relief when he leaves, and Castle is left, dazed, to sift through his desk to check if anything is missing. There's a stack of cash in a desk drawer that remains untouched and none of the more expensive electronics or toys have been disturbed, although Castle notes with dismay that one of his swords is broken.

Castle sits prone beside his mother, as CSU upend his home more thoroughly than whomever was here before them, and when they're at last done dusting for prints, he walks back through his bedroom, trailed closely by Martha.

He swings the closet door further open and he slides the inner door across. The safe itself appears untouched except for the fine trace of fingerprinting powder which has been added to the already significant layer of dust. He punches in the code, sighing in relief as he sees that it's all in order; nothing in here has been touched; paperwork, money and passports all stacked neatly.

"Everything there?" Wilson asks him, and Castle nods.

"Everything's there," he tells the detective.

"Good. It's a good spot for a safe," he tells Castle, but his tone is disinterested, and the man steps back into the study, leaving Castle and Martha alone in the bedroom.

Castle stands silently for a moment longer, and then with his mother watching him appraisingly, he strides back to the safe, picking up each of the documents in turn until he's satisfied that the files really are all still there.

He closes the again and sinks into the armchair by the bed, surveying the damage. Were they after the files? How could anyone have even known he had them? He's none too impressed by Wilson, but there's something else holding him back; if the intruders were looking for the case files, it's best if as few people know as possible. He won't say a word to the robbery detective, but perhaps tomorrow he can talk to Ryan and Esposito, and if he's lucky, he can leave Beckett out of it entirely.

Alexis comes home as the last of the uniforms are leaving, horror in her eyes as she realizes that something has happened while she's been at school. "Hamptons tomorrow?" she asks quietly, and Castle nods. He'll need to clean up here, but he wants to get away from the city, from his loft.

Martha shakes her head in dismay, surveying the scene before her. She turns on her heel, returning a minute later with a glass of wine in her hand, and she squeezes her granddaughter's shoulder.

The three of them make quick work of tidying the shelves; Alexis and Martha ease the books back onto the shelves, and Castle shoves the upended paperwork back into the appropriate drawers.

Alexis still looks shaken, although as Martha drains the last of her glass of wine, he notes that his mother looks quite a lot calmer. He wouldn't mind a drink, either, but instead he hugs his daughter to him, pressing a kiss into her red hair before asking. "Hotel tonight?"

* * *

Kate stretches, trying to work the kinks out of her back. She's packing up the murder board; it had taken more than she'd expected to get the confession out of Kristina Sokolova's boyfriend, and she's exhausted. She unpins the photos and scrubs at the dry-erase ink until it's all clear, and then she leans back against her desk, staring up at what is once again a blank slate.

Images swim before her eyes; her own thoughts come to life. Her mom's picture would have been on a board like this at one time; she's curious to know how long it had taken Raglan before he'd packed it up. Kate wonders if it had haunted him at night the way her own cold cases do her.

She scrubs tired hands across her eyes; the last few times that she's stayed back this late to finish up she's had Castle by her side. For a split second she considers texting him but she dismisses the urge; it's a habit, she tells herself, and completely unnecessary. She can't shake her feeling of trepidation though. There's a portent of fear swirling in her stomach, and Kate has no idea where it's coming from; she just knows that she's had an uncomfortable niggling for most of the day. She sighs, standing up when she sees Ryan and Esposito coming toward her, their computers already shut down.

She follows suit and switches off her own PC, following the boys into the elevator. She smiles tiredly at them and declines the offer of a drink. She needs her bed, not alcohol, in order to put this anxiety to rest. It's been a long couple of days; nothing a good night's sleep won't solve.

* * *

**A/N: Thanks for joining me on this journey, guys! Trish and Kylie, your advice and notes are invaluable. x**


	8. You're never going to win

An evening at the Four Seasons seems to be doing everyone good, Castle thinks. His mother has spent the evening drinking wine and generally behaving as though they were at the hotel for a treat, rather than because they were nervous about being in their own home.

Her attitude has been infectious and Alexis perks up as soon as they order room service. An evening watching movies may have set both Martha and Alexis' minds at ease, but Castle's fears haven't been so easily assuaged. In spite of his mother's insistence that the thieves had broken in looking for valuables, he remains unconvinced, and the conspiracy theories taking hold in his mind are disturbing.

Each time Martha tells the story of coming downstairs to a disturbance, her tale becomes more elaborate, until, fueled by too many glasses of wine, she's talking of scaring the intruders away before they could take anything. Castle nods and pretends to agree with her, but privately thinks the intruders had plenty of time to take money or objects, and he's more and more convinced that they left empty handed.

He wants to warn Beckett, but that would mean admitting what he's done, what he's taken from the precinct. He wishes he'd never thought to investigate it in the first place, that Esposito hadn't let him copy Johanna Beckett's file, and that Karpowski hadn't so easily allowed him into a restricted area.

He wishes that instead of dealing with a break in, he'd been at the scene yesterday. He knows nothing about the case they'd caught, just that if Beckett was there, he would have liked to have been there too.

Once he finally makes his way to bed in his half of the suite, he tosses and turns. Castle alternates between burying his head beneath the pillows, and stretching out on top of all the covers; it's a long time before sleep finds him.

* * *

Castle wakes to Alexis' face floating somewhere too close to his own; she's leaning right over him, her hands at the ready, about to tap his face. His mother is hovering in the background and he wonders vaguely just why this family seems to have no boundaries. "Dad!" his daughter hisses, and he rubs his face and winces, swatting her away.

"What?" he scowls, and she looks at him disapprovingly.

"Dad!" she says again, exasperated. "It's eleven in the morning. We need to go. If I'm skipping school to go to the Hamptons we need to actually _go_ there."

"Right." Castle sits up reluctantly.

"And-" Alexis raises an eyebrow and fixes him with her most innocent look. Even in his sleepy state, Castle thinks he knows what's coming next, and he's unsurprised by the next words out of his daughter's mouth. "I kind of need a new swimsuit- can I borrow your credit card?"

Castle notes that the need to shop is apparently genetic. For all that Alexis seems to have nothing else in common with her mother, she and Meredith certainly do share a love for his credit card. Then again, he supposes his daughter could have just as easily inherited that trait from her grandmother- Martha certainly enjoys burning through the plastic as well. His mother is standing behind Alexis, beaming down at him, and he sits up, pointing. "There. My wallet's there. Take the card. And go!"

"Thanks, Daddy," his fifteen year old squeals, planting a kiss on his cheek before dashing to the dresser housing his wallet, and he winces, covering his ears.

"Go," he says again, and he watches as the two red-heads exit, gleefully clutching at his credit card, before flopping back onto the bed.

* * *

"Seriously?" Beckett whirls around when she hears his familiar footfall behind her, and her eyes fall on Castle. Her instinct is to attack, although she regrets her words the moment they're out of her mouth. "Seriously. You're back here _again_? Robbery's on a different floor if you need to make a statement about yesterday. You know that." She shakes her head. Can the universe just give her a day without seeing him? A day to clear her head? Just one? There's something that aches in her heart when she looks at him.

"No," he says. "I'm just here to see Ryan and Esposito. I didn't mean to bother you."

She watches him take the few steps between her desk and the boys; each step is heavy, laden with fatigue, and she sighs before turning back to her computer, angrily scrolling through her emails and praying for her phone to ring with a body drop. With a distraction.

She looks up again to see Castle beckon both of the boys into the conference room, and she tries to hide the that fact she's watching as the two boys shrug at one another and follow Castle, curiosity apparent on both their faces.

Castle's back is to her, and Esposito is blocked by the window frame. She can see Ryan, though, and she watches him run a gamut of emotions; his mouth finally falling open in shock, and he looks out into the bullpen. She averts her eyes, but he catches her, and he schools his features, casting a nervous glance back at Castle.

Castle takes something from the bag he's had slung over his shoulder, and he hands it to the guys. She narrows her eyes, all pretense of not watching now tossed aside. It appears to be paperwork, neatly bound in a yellow folder, and she watches Esposito flick through it. The three men walk back into the bullpen, and Castle makes a beeline for the elevator; he doesn't look her way and she stares straight ahead as he passes; only allowing herself to pinch the bridge of her nose when she hears the chime of the elevator, and she knows that he's gone.

"What was-" she starts to ask the boys, but her prayers are answered, albeit a little later than she'd hoped, and her desk phone rings. She takes the down the details, grabs her jacket, and when she looks up, neither of the boys are anywhere to be seen.

* * *

Beckett returns from the scene covered in grime and scowling. She plucks at the threads on the sleeve of her jacket. This had been such a nice jacket, and she's cursing the killer; murdering someone is one thing, but murdering her jacket is another. Did he need to hide the body in such a filthy cellar? And one with so many rough surfaces? Her only consolation had been Lanie; as the M.E. had swiped at the wall that had torn Kate's sleeve she'd spotted some other threads. CSU were sweeping the scene thoroughly now, and Beckett hopes that they'll uncover some evidence she can use.

"Whoa, what happened to you?" Esposito exclaims, and Ryan smirks behind him.

"Crime scene," she spits out. "Which you would know, if you had been there. What's going on?"

Ryan shrugs uncomfortably, and the guys exchange a glance. "Tell you when you get cleaned up, okay?" She's starting to get a little worried and she decides; no matter what the boys tell her, she's going to talk to Castle tonight, really have it out with him. See if they can broker some peace.

Beckett nods, running a hand through her hair and rolling her eyes at the boys when another layer of dust is dislodged. "Right."

She takes the stairs two at a time to the floor above; there are showers in the ladies' bathrooms but she prefers the ones in the gym. The hot water tumbles over her and she takes the time to shampoo through her hair twice, cursing the lack of conditioner. She towels off and runs a brush through her hair; she wants to grow it again, the way she wore it when she was in her early twenties, before she'd chopped it all off the day she accepted her detective badge. Today, though, she's grateful that it barely reaches her shoulders because running a brush through it will be a nightmare.

Kate scrambles into the change of clothes she has in her locker; a pair of jeans and a soft t-shirt, a far cry from the professional slacks and shirt from this morning. She towels through her hair again; the hairdryer here is appalling and she's taken too long already. She has to get back downstairs; her own case is waiting for her, but she wants to know what the boys have got for her as well.

* * *

Esposito's on the phone when she comes down, though, and Ryan looks buried in paperwork, so she makes herself a coffee in the break room first, bypassing Castle's machine and making herself a cup from the older machine that's still sitting there. It's disgusting, but she figures she drank it for the last few years before Castle came along, and she can do it again.

Beckett crosses the floor to her desk and sits down, entering her password to access her computer. She glances up to see Esposito put the phone down, only to have it ring again, and she sighs, sipping at the coffee and making a face. Fine, she concedes to herself. As long as Castle's machine is here, she may as well use it, right?

She rolls her eyes at herself and stands. Life's too short to drink bad coffee and she trudges back into the break room, but Esposito calls her before she reaches the door.

"Beckett- It's Castle," Kate looks at him in annoyance, willfully ignoring the odd look on Espo's face.

"What about Castle?" she asks. "Another break in? What was even stolen last time anyway?" Nothing. She knows the answer. But she's not going to give anyone the satisfaction of knowing that she'd even looked at the file. No, absolutely not.

"Um." Esposito hesitates and Kate can't lie to herself anymore. Something is seriously wrong if Esposito is looking at her like that.

"Well?" she urges, frustrated by his silence and the apprehension in his eyes.

"He's-" Esposito shrugs, uncomfortable. "Kate, Castle's been shot."

There's a beat, and Kate feels the blood drain from her face. Her instinct is to stand, rush, and take charge. Her instinct is to _do_. She does nothing. Esposito's statement has sent chills down her spine, and she's frozen to the spot, unable to process anything as his words replay over and over in her head.

_Shot. Shot. Shot. "Castle's been shot."_

* * *

**A/N: Many thanks, Trish and Kylie for giving it a look through! And to all you readers... I'm sorry for shooting Castle. Oops. **


	9. Sorry I cannot keep you safe

Kate moves at last. Her limbs are heavy, and each step toward Esposito's desk is like walking through quicksand.

"Shot?" she asks, and her voice comes out shakily. "What do you mean, shot?"

"Shot, Kate," comes Esposito's reply, his voice filled with a raw grief. "A couple of hours ago. A bullet in his left shoulder. He was walking back to his place, we think, after he left here."

"Long walk," Ryan comments, and Esposito shrugs.

"Is he…" She trails off. Doesn't want to hear the next words. Not if she's going to hear that her… what? Her shadow? Her friend? Her _writer_, her mind settles on. She doesn't want to hear that her writer is dead. But if he wasn't far from here, and she hasn't had a homicide call? She dares to hope, holding her breath.

"He's alive." Esposito's voice breaks though the rush of blood pounding in her head and she breathes again. "He's in surgery. That's all I know. That's all they said. Martha and Alexis are on their way to the hospital now."

Kate slumps against Esposito's desk; she can't hold herself up anymore. She buries her face in her hands, giving herself to the count of ten to regain her composure. One. Two. Three… She'd decided when she'd seen him this morning that she was going to make peace with him. Four. Five. Six. Is this how their entire relationship ends? On seven she stands up straight, dropping her arms to her side, on eight, she opens her eyes. Nine. Ten. She takes a deep breath. It can't end this way.

"What do we know?"

Ryan sighs. "We don't know anything, but we have a few theories," he starts. "So, we know Castle had started looking into your mom's case."

Kate sighs heavily. "Yeah. Not with my blessing. Wait- _what_? What does this have to do with my mom's case? I thought this was just some random "wrong place, wrong time" kind of thing?"

Ryan shakes his head. "Maybe. But I don't think so. Did Castle tell you what he found when he started looking?"

"Yeah. Other cases. Like my mom's." It's taking all she has to remain standing, and she sinks against Esposito's desk again, giving up on the idea of remaining upright while she listens to this.

"Uh-huh. So it seems like an awfully big coincidence that his house gets broken into and then he gets shot, all in the forty-eight hours since Karpowski gave him access to those other three files, right?

"She didn't!" Kate's horrified.

"She did," Ryan nods. "That's why he was here this morning. He brought the files back, because he figured out that's what the intruders were looking for yesterday."

"Yeah," Esposito agrees. "He had a bad feeling. He thought that if he came by, he could return the files, pretend it never happened. And he didn't want to tell you- he was still hoping he'd be able to patch things up eventually."

Ryan smiles, a wry curve of his lips that is belied by the sadness in his eyes. "He realized he'd gone too far. He realized there were good reasons you weren't looking into the case anymore, and he was really worried. You know his whole family stayed in a hotel last night? Little Castle was freaked."

Kate bites her lip, pushing down the concern she's feeling. A cop. She's a cop, and that's how she has to act right now. "And Karpowski? How does she figure into this?"

"I don't think she knew," Esposito clarifies. "I think he cornered her when he was here the other day, and she didn't quite realize the implications of what she was doing, thought she was just helping him out. She didn't have any idea whose files they were, or what they had to do with your mom."

"Okay." Kate huffs out a sigh. "That's fine. But if all she did was give him access to the files, what exactly happened to get Castle shot?"

* * *

"I was buying a swimsuit,'' Alexis tells her dully.

Kate can only nod. "It's okay," she says at last, thinking that the girl needs a response, feeling awfully inadequate as she stands beside Castle's mom and daughter, seeking information that neither can provide.

"Oh, darling." Martha entwines Alexis into an embrace and Kate watches the girl melt into her grandmother's arms. She's taken aback when a second later Martha reaches an arm out and brings her into the fold. It's an awkward position, but Kate finds she doesn't mind at all, and she hugs them both in return, patting Alexis on the shoulder steadily.

She turns her head when she sees the boys out of the corner of her eye. "What have we got?" she asks abruptly, tearing herself away from the red-heads.

"Not much," Esposito tells her, and Ryan shuffles uncomfortably before meeting her eyes.

"We have some theories though, and you're not going to like them."

"Tell me," is all she says and Ryan looks at Martha reluctantly. The older woman nods at them and guides Alexis out of earshot.

"Come on," she says to the teenager. "Let's get an update on your father."

Once they've made their way down the hall and turned toward the nurses' station, Kate turns to the guys. "Tell me," she says again, and Ryan nods.

"You're not going to like it," he remarks, an unsettling look on his face.

* * *

Kate catches up with Martha and Alexis after the boys fill her in. She's stony faced, horrified by what she's learned, but she pushes it aside. She needs to stay strong for Castle's family.

Martha is wringing her hands and Beckett is surprised to find Alexis is providing comfort to her grandmother instead of the other way around. "We both knew, Gram," Alexis is telling Martha, but the older redhead just shakes her head.

"No, sweetheart. I should have stopped him. Said something. Told someone." She looks up guiltily as Kate approaches.

"Told someone what, Martha?" Kate asks, and the older woman sighs.

"Oh, Katherine," Martha proclaims, and Beckett is as thrown by the use of her full first name as she is by anything else. "I knew," she confesses. "After the break-in yesterday- well, this has to be related, doesn't it?"

Kate nods.

"I knew Richard was investigating your mother's case on his own, and I didn't stop him," Martha continues. "I even encouraged him to tell you what Dr. Murray found out. I said he couldn't keep it from you, even if you didn't speak to him again. Oh, darling. He was so upset when he realized how much he was going to hurt you, but I told him it didn't matter."

Kate bites down on her lip. She'd assumed the worst when Castle started looking into her mom's case. He could be so childish, so self-centered, but she's starting to realize that he really hadn't intended to hurt her, he just hadn't known.

"I told him he had to tell you- that you needed to know, even if you hated him," Martha continues, and Kate closes her eyes, briefly. She wants to turn the clock back in time and start everything again.

"It doesn't matter now," she says, patting Martha on the arm awkwardly, and pressing her lips together before continuing; she's afraid to ask, afraid of what the answer might be. "Did you find out how Castle is doing?"

"He's okay," Alexis tells her, tears running down her face, as though she's all of a sudden done being brave. The dam has burst, and she sobs it out, her voice breaking as she tells Kate. "He's though the surgery. He's going to wake up."

* * *

Kate wakes to a gut wrenching sound. A wail. It just doesn't seem to be stopping, and it takes Kate a moment to realize the sound is her own cry, a strangled gasp that has her sitting up, gasping for air. The sobs come more freely now that she recognizes that she's crying; heavy tears have rolled their way down her cheeks, and dampened her pillow.

Shot. Castle's been shot.

And it's her fault.

It's her mom's case, and it goes deeper than she'd ever realized; has more significance than she'd known. It's much more far reaching, and the consequences of one woman killed in an alley are apparently more serious than she'd ever guessed.

She'd always assumed the crime was meaningless to everyone but her father and herself. The case had never been solved, but she'd put that down to lazy police work, inadequate man power at best.

The entire week has been disquieting. Castle always has a wild theory, and her conservative approached at realism doesn't seem that relevant now. She and the boys have pieced a lot together, but crucial information is still conspicuously absent and she'd left the precinct reluctantly after running through everything with the boys more than once this evening. She's still amazed at the jumble of coincidence that seems to be connecting everything.

She's worked beside Roselyn Karpowski for three years; their teams have crossed paths a hundred times. They share the same floor, the same break room. They use the same interrogation rooms, and they collaborate from time to time. But over the years they've never become close, and Kate hadn't known- never had any reason to know- that Raglan had been a family friend, drinking buddies with Karpowski's dad, a mentor of sorts to the younger detective.

And Karpowski had never had any reason to know that Raglan had been the lead detective on Kate's mom's case. In fact, if she even knew the reason Beckett had become a detective, she hadn't ever let on, which was just the way Beckett preferred it.

It had been a coincidence, plain and simple; Karpowski had had dinner with her parents the night she gave Castle the file and Raglan had been there; he'd stopped by to borrow something, and Karpowski had found herself filling him in on the writer's presence in the precinct; just idle chit chat.

Raglan is unaccounted for. Either a victim himself, or off the grid; Kate can't really hazard a guess at which. She's none the wiser to _what_ he was covering up, but she's certain at last that something has been hidden.

She'd spent half a decade of trying to solve the case, before spending a year in therapy. And yet she'd missed something huge. Somehow Castle had found answers in just a matter of months.

Kate finds herself crying out again, clawing at the sheets that are suffocating her now; she pushes them away, gasping as she reaches to flip the lamp on beside her bed, bathing the room in light, but still the demons aren't relegated to the shadows.

Castle had found something. A link.

And now he's been shot.

* * *

**A/N: Many thanks for reading... and reviewing if you're so inclined. :) And thanks to Kylie and Trish for the betaing! x**


	10. I'll be outside your window at night

Castle wakes slowly. He's so groggy, and there's something tethering his arm... he tries to lift his right hand to pluck at whatever is restraining his left, but it's too heavy and he lets it fall slackly to his side again. He opens his eyes reluctantly, blinking in surprise. What is his mother doing here? And his daughter? He twists his head a little. And Beckett? What is Beckett doing in his room?

"What-" he starts to say, but his voice is a mere croak.

At the sound though, three heads jerk up in unison, worry apparent in each set of eyes.

"Richard!" his mother exclaims.

"Dad, you're awake!" He looks at his daughter more closely. Her cheeks are tear-stained and he narrows his eyes, looking around and trying to assess the situation from the beginning.

There's something on his arm. He looks, sees his left arm is strapped to his chest and his right is attached to an IV. His mother, his daughter and his... Beckett, his mind hazily decides, unable to supply much else. If he even _thinks_ muse, she'll kill him. His mother, his daughter and his Beckett are all sitting around his bed. His bed? This isn't his bed. It's too narrow. And the room is too bright. It's taken a while, but he realizes. He's in hospital.

It all floods back then. Leaving the files with the boys at the Twelfth. Taking a long look at Beckett from across the bullpen as he'd waited for the elevator. Deciding to walk the first few blocks to clear his head before catching a cab. Cutting through a quiet park. Pulling his cell phone from his pocket to call his daughter. And a shock of pain; falling, stumbling and landing heavily on his back. The concerned faces of strangers huddling over him.

He realizes in a flash of panic. He was shot.

He's struggling to breathe all of a sudden, and Beckett leaps up; he sees her press the call button, and his daughter clutches at his hand. His mother's eyes are wide, and she's clenching her fists. A dark haired nurse bustles in, places a calming hand on his arm, and smoothly adjusts the medication flowing into the IV.

"Mr. Castle," she says. "You've given your family here quite a fright." She smiles warmly at the three women, and he wonders, just for a second, who, exactly, Beckett is claiming to be. Surely _muse_ doesn't fall in the 'family' category? The thought is fleeting and he turns to more pressing issues.

"What's going on?"

He tries- and fails- to focus his eyes on the nurse's name badge, but the room is swimming. "Rest, now," she soothes, and he glances at Beckett, hoping for clarification, but she's biting her nails and literally sitting on the edge of the overstuffed blue sofa.

Castle fades out again.

* * *

Beckett had arrived at the hospital at three in the morning. Sleep had been elusive, and she'd tossed and turned another hour before sighing and pulling on a pair of jeans and a soft sweater. The city, too, was wide awake, and she'd found a cab easily, directing the driver to the hospital. She'd been relieved as the cab had pulled up to the curb that this wasn't the same hospital Will was in. What were the odds of the two of them being shot within days of one another?

She'd paid the cab driver, tipping the man generously; nobody wanted to be working at this time of night, she'd figured, and she'd made her way into the imposing building, wrinkling her nose at the familiar hospital smell that assaulted her nostrils before she'd even crossed the threshold.

Even at the three in the morning, the place was lit up, and the buzz of the fluorescent lights had had her shielding her eyes for a second as she'd gotten her bearings. She'd learned Castle's room number and made it as far as the second floor; a recovery ward, apparently; before she'd been stopped by a harried looking nurse.

"You're not supposed to be down here," the blond woman had told her, and Kate had shrugged.

"I'm NYPD," she'd tried, but she didn't have her badge with her. Besides, she was hardly here on official business, unless NYPD business suddenly included trauma induced insomnia.

"You'll have to come back in the morning," the nurse had insisted, and Kate had frowned, reading the woman's name badge. Elizabeth. She couldn't come back. She couldn't. She needed to be here, see for herself that Castle was okay. The whole thing was her fault, and even if she had to stay downstairs, hiding out in a waiting room she wasn't leaving-

"Katherine!" Martha's surprised face had had a weariness to it that was levels beyond what Kate had seen this afternoon, but she was pleased to see a warm smile on the woman's face.

"Mrs. Rodgers?" Elizabeth had asked, and Martha had nodded.

"Kate can come in, dear. She can stay with us- she's Richard's girlfriend."

"Is this true?" Elizabeth had turned appraising eyes back to Beckett, who gulped. "I thought you said you were NYPD?"

"Uh-huh." Kate nodded. "NYPD. And… girlfriend." Was girlfriend even enough? The other options had flooded through her mind. Fiancée. Wife. She'd breathed in deeply, trying to calm herself again.

Narrowed eyes had had Beckett wincing, but the nurse nodded. "Go on," she'd said, shooing Kate toward the door. "Go on in."

* * *

"Girlfriend, huh?" There had been a smile in Alexis' voice; the girl had been stretched out on a cot and evidently she had heard the whole exchange.

"Oh, hush," Martha had waved a hand at the girl, and Kate had suppressed a smile. "If NYPD accreditation wasn't going to be enough to get poor Katherine here past Nurse Ratched, I knew I had to think fast." She'd laid a hand on Kate's and leaned in conspiratorially. "And it will amuse Richard no end when he wakes up tomorrow."

Kate had smiled weakly. "He hasn't woken up yet?"

"Briefly," Martha had assured her. "But he's under a lot of sedation. When he woke earlier he panicked, and moved too quickly, so he tore a few stitches."

"He's okay, Kate," Alexis had told her softly, and a lump had formed in Kate's throat; she'd dragged Castle down into this whole mess; perhaps if she'd been more open about her mom's case from the beginning… In spite of her place in the whole situation, both Martha and Alexis have been nothing but gracious to her. She had realized that Alexis has used her first name instead of calling her Detective Beckett, and tears had prickled at her eyes.

"Come on, now," Martha had said, gracefully lowering herself on the stark looking sofa, next to Alexis' cot. She'd held out an arm, beckoning Kate across the dimly lit room. "If we're spending the night here, we may as well as be uncomfortable together."

* * *

"What are you all doing here?" Castle is faintly pleased when he wakes up the next time. He's managed to get a sentence out, and he hasn't panicked yet; no nurses are rushing in, adjusting his medication, and he even knows why he's here. The smile falls from his face; he's here because he was shot, but as all three sets of eyes jerk up to look at him, he pushes the grin back onto his lips.

"Castle!" Beckett's the first to speak this time, and he sees the small smile that plays at his daughter's lips as she watches Kate. "Castle- I'm so sorry." He watches as her face crumples and he's reaching out his hand involuntarily, cursing the shooting pain in his shoulder and the IV that he's attached to, because when she looks at him like that, with that much pain in her eyes, his only instinct is to hold her.

"Come here," he rasps out instead, and he watches her stand and take a hesitant step toward him. She glances at Martha, and his mother nods. This seems to propel Kate forward, and he watches, spellbound, at the scene that unfurls before him.

"Darling, let's get a coffee," Martha tells Alexis, and his daughter's eyes narrow.

"But, Gram…"

Martha shakes her head at the younger red-head, and casts another glance at Kate. "We'll leave you two alone for a moment," she says, and she throws a gentle arm around Alexis, guiding her from the room.

The whole thing takes just a moment, and suddenly he's left alone with Beckett; he's self-conscious, ridiculously, running his tongue over his teeth and screwing up his face. "Water," he manages; he can see a pitcher and several glasses on the nightstand, and Kate nods, leaping to action.

She pours him a glass, and hands it to him but he's helpless to drink it; he's lying down, and he can't quite sit up and she frowns, assessing the situation, before tackling the problem. She bites her lip and dives in, twisting the handles on the bed, and he finds himself raised to a sitting position swiftly.

He's relieved to find he can lift his right arm to bring the water to his lips, painful though it is.

"What happened, Kate?"

She shrugs and settles into the plastic chair beside his bed. "You were shot?"

He winces. Every time he moves he's reminded of that. "I know… I mean… why? Because of the files, right?"

Kate lowers her eyes, and he's frustrated again; he wants to reach out, cup her chin in his hands.

"Come here," he says instead, patting the space on his bed beside him, and she looks up, horrified.

"Castle! I am not getting into bed with you!"

He chuckles, ignoring the discomfort it brings. If statements like that are coming out of Beckett's mouth, things must be okay between them, he decides. Banter and verbal foreplay is more their status quo, than the last few days of hurt. He wiggles his eyebrows at her and is graced with the ghost of a smile. "Have you slept?" he asks, and she shrugs.

"Some," she tells him, but he remains unconvinced; the circles under her eyes are dark and heavy. She takes a deep breath. "Castle- someone found out you had the files."

"Who?" he asks, and Kate hesitates before answering.

"Karpowski knows the detective who was the lead on my mother's case. Raglan" She reaches a shaking hand out to the pitcher on his nightstand, and pours herself a glass of water, taking a sip before she continues. "I always figured that he was lazy. Incompetent. I figured he'd never found anything because he just wasn't doing his job right. But he was covering. This whole time, he was covering for somebody."

Her eyes flash with anger and Castle settles his heavy head back against his pillow. "Did Raglan shoot me?"

Kate shrugs. "We don't know. We went to his apartment, after you were shot." She pauses, composing herself. "He's not there. No sign of a struggle. We don't know if he's your shooter, and we don't know who he's talked to. We don't know how involved he is in your shooting, or my mom's case. We really don't know if he's been taken out, or if he's taken himself out of the picture. The boys are looking into it this morning."

She shrugs again and he's struck by how young she looks right now; she's a world away from the hard-edged detective he'd met six months ago at his book launch party.

"God, Castle- you were _shot_," she says suddenly and the anguish in her voice jolts him; he can hear a layer of guilt and he sighs.

He'd pursued her relentlessly since he'd first met her; initially to try and get her into bed, and now, as so much more than a conquest. She's fascinated him from the very first moment, and he realizes that he's in love with her. That he's been in love with her since the night she'd told him about her mom. "Kate," he starts, and her wry smile startles him.

"Doesn't anyone call me Beckett anymore?"

"Why?" he asks. "Who? What are they calling you?"

She purses her lips. "Your daughter is calling me Kate. Your mom is calling me Katherine. The nurses think-" She breaks off, a faint blush coloring her cheeks.

Huh. He remembers this from when he woke up earlier. The nurses think she's family. "Kate?" he asks. "Who, exactly, do the nurses think you are?"

* * *

**Thanks Trish and Kylie for the beta! :)  
**


	11. Can't fight gravity

Kate leaves the hospital feeling lighter. Castle's going to be okay. She'd refused to confess that she'd claimed to be his girlfriend in order to gain admittance to his room last night, but she's got no doubt that Martha and Alexis will fill him in the next time he wakes.

She scrubs at her eyes; she's still only on three hours of sleep, but in spite of her weariness, she hails a cab and gets it to drop her off at the precinct.

"What have we got?" she asks the boys, and they turn from the white board to face her.

"We've been here since six, Beckett," Ryan teases. "It's ten now. Where have you been?"

She blushes. "At the hospital, okay?" Esposito raises an eyebrow, and she counters with narrowed eyes. "Drop it."

Esposito shrugs, but she sees the hint of a smile at the corner of his mouth, and she thinks she hears him whisper "_good_" under his breath before he clears his throat. "How's Castle?" he asks.

"He's… okay. Drugged up, but otherwise good. The surgery went well and he was awake for a few hours this morning. I left him with Martha and Alexis when he fell asleep." She nods at the board; Castle's DMV picture is front and center, and she blinks and exhales slowly; she has to remind herself he's not there because he's a homicide victim. "Where are we with the investigation?"

"We haven't got much more than yesterday, Beckett. Without Raglan, we're dead in the water. We've searched his apartment, gone through his phone records. There's nothing."

"Not nothing," Montgomery tells them, coming out of his office. "They've found Raglan. He's been found dead, upstate." He shakes his head. "It looks like a suicide. CSU are on the scene, along with local police. It looks like he shot himself with the same gun used on Castle."

Kate flinches. The lightness that she'd felt upon leaving the hospital has dissipated, and a blanket of fear has settled in its place. None of this sits right with her. "And this all ties back to my mom's case," she muses, thinking out loud, but Castle's not there and there's no-one else with whom she can bounce ideas in quite the same way.

"What are you saying, Beckett?" the Captain asks, and she shrugs.

"If we reopen her case-"

The Captain raises his hand. "Stop right there, Beckett," he says. "We're not there yet. Raglan's been found- and it looks like he's the one who shot Castle. But let's let the cops upstate do their job and confirm that for us." Kate stares at Montgomery for a moment before speaking.

"And in the meantime, Captain? Because with all due respect, if this really is about my mom's case, I'm probably walking around with a target on my back."

The Captain looks at her appraisingly, and Beckett feels again like the rookie she was when she'd first met Montgomery. She'd been in the archives without authorization, and he'd found her out. He'd looked at her long and hard before giving her a moment's grace. "You won't be here when I come back in ten minutes," he'd told her before closing the door and leaving her to copy her mom's file.

"Beckett," he says at last. "It looks like Raglan covered something up in your mom's case. Maybe he was even more involved- who knows? We may never be sure. But he's dead now."

"And Castle?" Kate asks, words failing her as she fights the sudden lump in her throat.

"Castle's alive, Beckett," Montgomery says, and she guesses he's trying to be comforting. "Let's talk to the guys upstate. If we can confirm Raglan was our shooter, we can put this case to bed."

Beckett leans back against her desk. She doesn't miss the reassuring look Esposito throws her, or the glimmer of hope in Ryan's eyes, and she buries her face in her hands for a second before nodding. "Well, let's go talk to the guys upstate, then."

* * *

Castle's been drifting in and out of sleep since Kate left this morning. He's unconvinced that she's okay, but before he'd fallen asleep the last time, his mother had pointed out that since he was the one currently lying in a hospital bed, he could stand to worry less about Kate and more about himself. He wakes slowly this time; the light has changed and the room is bathed in a warm, pink glow which offers a nice countenance to the harsh overheads.

"Have you two even slept?" he asks, glancing up at the two overwrought faces and Alexis and his mother both look up at him.

Martha shrugs, but Alexis nods. "Sure, Dad. We got some sleep last night." She points at the sofa and the cot against the wall and he sighs.

"Go home," he tells them. He doesn't really want to be alone, but he's drifting in and out of sleep; he figures they should be able to do the same.

"But, dad," Alexis starts, but he shakes his head.

"I'm okay, Pumpkin," he tells her.

"You're not okay. You got shot." Kate's voice is thin and he turns in surprise. She's leaning against the door frame, two cups of coffee in her hands. He's relieved to see that she must have been home because she's changed her clothes since this morning. The dark circles under her eyes do nothing to comfort him though.

"Yeah," he nods, wiggling his eyebrows at her. "Kind of badass, right?"

He's successful in getting a smile on her face, and is pleased to see there's a smile on his daughter's face too.

"Is there any news, dear?" his mother asks Kate, and the detective shakes her head, placing one of the coffees on the night stand. Castle reads a hesitation in Kate's eyes, but if his mother notices she ignores it, beckoning to Alexis. "Let's go," she says, and she's waving and out the door before he can blink.

Alexis takes the time to kiss him on the cheek and he catches her throw a sly look Beckett's way. "We'll be back in the morning," she promises and he smiles.

"Love you," he tells his daughter.

"Something I said?" Kate asks, as she settles into the chair by his bed.

He shakes his head. "I told them to go home. I've been sleeping so much- they should get the chance to do the same." He reaches for the coffee. "Tell me this isn't decaf?"

She grins for a second. "Sorry." The smile falls from her lips and she chews on her thumbnail and watches him for a moment before she casts her eyes away and speaks. "Castle- when I told you to stay away from my mom's case- that was all about me. You know that, right?"

She's lost him, and he shakes his head. "Beckett, I'm on a ton of drugs and my mind's very fuzzy. You're going to have to slow it down for me."

She nods. "Okay. I mean, I spent a long time looking into my mom's case," she shakes her head like she's trying to push the memory away. "And then I went to therapy because- well, because Montgomery made me. He told me I needed to sort myself out, that if I was going to be a first class detective I had to put it behind me and stop chasing ghosts."

"You don't have to tell me this, Kate," Castle says. "Not if you don't want to."

She looks up at him, meeting his eyes with a soft smile. "I want to," she assures him. "When you suggested looking into my mom's case, all I could picture was those sleepless nights. I spent so much time at the precinct, and I had copies of everything at home, too. I had helped my dad get some support, and he wasn't drinking anymore, but I was a mess and I was falling apart. Roy was the only one who saw it. Even Mike…"

"Who's Mike?"

"Oh. My training officer," she says, just a little too fast, and he catches the blush. Boyfriend, then. Or, he supposes, ex-boyfriend. An odd twinge of jealousy settles upon him. But he pushes it away, she's speaking again. "Castle, in all my investigations, I never found anything that made me think that getting into this case would be… dangerous. I didn't think you'd be hurt."

"Oh, Beckett," he says. "I know. I didn't-" he chuckles. "I'm sorry. I didn't know- I just wanted to help. I know you think I was just pushing my way in, but I really did want to help. And I didn't exactly think I'd get shot either. But I don't blame you. Not for a second."

"You should," she whispers, and he sees a tear fall from the corner of her eye and run down her cheek.

"Come here," he says, like he had this morning, but he doesn't pat his bed this time, just beckons her forward and she obliges, shifting her chair closer. He holds out his hand and she looks at it for a moment, before folding her own smaller hand into it, and they sit in silence for a spell.

* * *

"So what's going on with the case?" Castle asks suddenly. Kate blinks. She'd thought Castle had fallen asleep. She withdraws her hand from his before answering.

"We took witness statements yesterday. No-one in the park saw anything, except for you falling. Whoever shot you took off in the confusion- maybe? And the boys and I drove upstate today, to a little cabin. A neighbor heard a shot being fired and went to investigate. Raglan was found dead, and it looks self-inflicted. The same gun was used on you."

"Does that mean he shot me?"

Kate shrugs. "It looks like it."

"But you're not convinced," he says, and she shakes her head. Damn, he can read her well. She wishes she could get more past him.

"No," she says slowly, considering. Everything's been in fast forward this week and she's having trouble finding solid ground. "I'm not convinced of anything, anymore."

* * *

**A/N: Thanks for the beta, T & K! And all the reviews that pushed me over 200- yippee, you warm my heart! Happy Monday everyone! x**


	12. I ordered two coffees, one is for you

The last few days have taken on a pattern. Unconvinced that Castle's shooting is solved, Beckett goes into the Twelfth early each morning. She works on the case before Montgomery gets in, but doesn't dare reopen her mother's file. She is grateful that her team haven't had a fresh body drop in days and her time is spent catching up on paperwork and chasing up old cases.

She excuses herself from the precinct dead on five each evening so that she can stop by the hospital on her way home. Each time Beckett tells Castle (and herself) that she's only staying for five minutes; that she's just checking up on him, and updating him on the case. Never mind that there are no new leads. Raglan has been declared Castle's shooter, and the case has been officially closed.

Each time, Beckett finds herself staying longer and sharing a meal with Castle and his family. Castle refuses to eat the hospital fare, and Alexis has happily ordered in for them each night. Sitting in the stark hospital room each evening, they banter about everything under the sun; including time-travel, zombies and vampires. Unsurprisingly, Castle manages to make a case for why each of these things probably exists, and she refutes every one of his theories with sound logic. She's seen the expressions Martha and Alexis are giving the two of them as they jest with one another though, and she's not sure she's quite comfortable with the knowing looks on their faces.

For that matter, she's seen the looks Castle is giving her. And she's not sure she's comfortable with them, either.

The worst part is, that while she's not sure she's ready to admit it to herself, she thinks she's returning his soft looks with some of her own.

She gets to the hospital early this afternoon; Montgomery had shooed her out of the precinct at three telling her she'd done enough unpaid overtime over the last few years, and it wouldn't hurt her to take a little time off. She's almost suspicious of him making allowances for her but she doesn't want to look a gift horse in the mouth. She hadn't wanted to be the recipient of another knowing look from Ryan and Esposito either, so she'd made a beeline for the elevator and taken the subway to the hospital.

* * *

Kate taps on the door, surprised to see Castle standing, fully dressed. She blushes as she realizes she's been staring just a moment too long.

"Beckett." He turns and smiles at her knock.

"Hey, Castle." Kate smiles back, handing him a coffee. "It's the real thing this time," she promises, and his eyes light up.

"Thank you," he says, and his fingers brush hers just a moment longer than they need to as he takes the cup from her.

"What are you doing dressed?" she asks.

"I'm out of here," he says. "I'm just waiting for the last doctor to sign off on it, and Alexis is coming by…" He glances at his watch. "Any minute now." His left arm is strapped to his chest, but he's otherwise mobile, and Kate watches in silence for a moment as he takes an appreciative sip from the coffee, then puts it down to continue packing a few more things into the overnight bag on the bed.

"Nice." Beckett nods. She's happy for him; he's been a better patient than she would have predicted but she knows he's been going stir crazy confined to these four walls. "Home, huh?" It's become kind of comfortable, coming into the hospital each day, and she wonders whether she needs an invitation to stop by the loft, whether they'll continue spending time together.

"Home, kind of, yeah," Castle says, struggling to fold a t-shirt one handed before giving up and just shoving it into the bag. "We're going to go out to the Hamptons, actually. I have a place there, and Alexis wants to get away from the city."

Kate's heart sinks when he mentions leaving the city. But she's got no hold on him here, she reminds herself, so she pushes the thought aside. "Alexis is still kind of freaked out, huh?"

"She is," he agrees. "I can always tell something's wrong when she wants to miss school." Kate smiles to herself. He's a good father.

Something else occurs to her. "Does she blame me?" she asks quietly.

"What?" Castle shakes his head frantically. "No. She's upset, but she knows it's not your fault." He smiles softly. "It's _not _your fault. _You_ know that, right?"

Kate ducks her head and nods, changing the subject. "Can I help?" She indicates the packing.

"Sure. But there's not much left to do."

Kate smiles and puts her own coffee down, walking into the little bathroom off his room. She picks up his toothbrush and razor from beside the sink and she tucks the two objects into the toiletries bag that already houses his toothpaste and soap, rolling her eyes as she realizes just how domestic this is.

"What are you smiling about?" Castle asks her when she comes out of the bathroom and unceremoniously dumps the bathroom products into the top of the open bag. "You didn't find any dirty magazines in there, did you? Because I swear, they're not mine."

"Please," she retorts. "Like you could shock me, Castle."

"Oh, I could shock you, Detective," he tells her, and she feels her heart skip a beat as their gaze locks.

"Hardly," she says, trying for a little levity, and looking away. "After all, Castle, I've worked in Vice, you know."

"I know," he tells her, a raise of his eyebrow suddenly setting off an unfamiliar feeling in her stomach. Butterflies, she recognizes, and some part of her inner monologue mocks her, and she closes her eyes for a second. Why? She wonders. She and Castle have spent the last few months tripping over one another, flirting with their boundaries. They had been living in never-gonna-happen land, but that didn't mean the innuendo hadn't been a lot of fun.

Suddenly, though, never-gonna-happen land feels a lot more like gonna-happen land, and Beckett opens her eyes to find his impossibly blue ones fixed on her. They're on opposite sides of the bed, though, staring at one another across his overnight bag, and she looks away at last.

"So Gina's given me an extension," he tells her. "On account of not being able to type one-handed." He winces. "Or write actual sentences when I'm on painkillers."

Beckett cocks her head. "That was the voice of experience," she says. "You've tried to write on painkillers before?"

He nods, and the look of woe that comes into his eyes causes to her chuckle. "A few years ago. Minor car accident-"

"Not that minor, as far as the car was concerned," a voice interrupts, and Kate turns to the source. "It was a disaster."

"Thank you, Mother," Castle smirks at Beckett though, and she smiles back. "It was just so dull, though. I think I'd rather wreck a Ferrari-"

"I think I'd rather you stopped getting yourself into trouble," Alexis chides as she steps into the room, a few paces behind her grandmother, and Castle groans, conceding defeat.

Beckett's cell chimes then, and she narrows her eyes at the phone before taking the call. "Beckett." She steps into the corridor to take the call, and groans as she realizes it's dispatch yet again.

"Murder?" Castle asks, when she steps back into the room, and she nods.

"Murder." She's struck by the urge to reach over and cover Alexis' ears, but she restrains herself; no doubt the girl has seen and heard worse, living with a mystery novelist. "A piano player over on Broadway."

"Oh!" Martha lifts her hand to her heart. "That's terrible! Who would kill an artist?"

"So many people," Castle mumbles, and Kate has to stop herself from chuckling at his inappropriate comment. "Oh," he adds, his wide eyes fixing on Beckett again. "The doctor's going to come by any minute now, to let me go. So can I come?"

* * *

When Kate gets back to her apartment it's impossibly late and she flops onto the sofa. The case is anything but the open and shut ones from last week, and it has taken all her reserve to work through what she could this evening before finally calling it a night. She's been on her feet from the moment she got to the scene, and she kicks her heels off, sighing in relief as she wriggles her toes. More than once tonight she'd glanced at the boys and found herself longing for Castle.

She's being silly, she decides. She's solved cases for years without him, and just a week ago, she was ready to throw their whole relationship away. It's different now though, she muses. It shouldn't be, perhaps. She wishes his shooting didn't feel like such a wake-up call, but it does. It's forced her hand. She's still gun-shy, but she's realized she needs Castle in her life. More to the point, she wants him in her life.

Sighing, Kate hauls herself up from the sofa; she had come home to get a good night's sleep in her own bed, not to exchange the precinct sofa for her own; experience tells her that she'll wake with a crick in her neck if she lets herself fall asleep here.

She connects her cell to her charger in the bedroom and strips off, then pulls on some pajamas without bothering to remove her make-up. Her phone chirps, and she pulls it across the nightstand. She's expecting it to be one of the boys, something case related, but she's pleasantly surprised to see it's a message from Castle. _Sleep well, Detective._

_Sleep well, Writer_, she returns, and she falls into a dreamless sleep.

* * *

The next week slams Beckett, and her thoughts are forced from Castle to the details of the case at hand. She and the boys trace every twist of the case, but they're left with dead ends at every turn. Each evening she comes home only to eat, fall into bed, and message Castle. If she's entirely honest with herself, it's messaging Castle that she's come to look forward to.

He's been texting her during the day, too, and on more than one occasion she's been torn away from the case by the low buzz of her cell in her pocket. Likewise, on more than one occasion (once in the morgue and twice in the bullpen) the boys or Lanie have had occasion to call her out on the soft smile that's found its way onto her face.

Her threats to bust the boys down to traffic are falling on deaf ears, and there's nothing she can threaten Lanie with.

The texts Castle sends through are mostly funny, and a little sexy, and she wonders how many can be attributed to the drugs he's on. Surely he'd stopped taking the strongest of the painkillers by the time he'd left the hospital?

_How's the case? _He asks one morning, and when she replies to say it's fine (a lie), his somewhat off-topic response causes her to drop her jaw indignantly. _I'm sitting by the pool, Detective. If you were here I'd rub lotion on you._

Another afternoon finds her chuckling at her desk. _Just pulled my stitches… the moaning that occurred would have left even you blushing, Detective_.

_I'm sorry I went behind your back and hurt you_, he writes one evening, and she has to blink the tears back from her eyes, because she knows he is.

_I'm worried about the boys_, he texts her at one stage and she texts him back right away. _Why?_ His response is immediate. _I'm not there to supply your coffee… hope you're not punishing them just because you don't know how to use the machine in the break room._

The night before they solve the case, he's got three words for her that bring a rueful smile to her lips. _I miss you_. Kate misses him too.

* * *

**A/N: Thank Trish and Kylie for the beta! And thanks to you guys for reading! One more chapter!**


	13. Love is like falling

"Sir?" Beckett knocks on the Captain's door at two in the afternoon. She's sent their killer to holding, and she's just about done with the paperwork.

"Come in, Beckett," Montgomery nods at her. "I see you wrapped up the case? Good work."

"Thank you, Sir. It wasn't an easy one." Beckett runs a tired hand through her hair and the Captain smiles at her.

"Hell of a week," he offers. "Take a seat."

Beckett sinks down in the chair opposite gratefully. Montgomery is looking at her intently, and she thinks she sees worry in his eyes. "Sir- I'd like to take a few of my vacation days."

His dark eyes narrow at her, and she gulps. "You've earned them, Beckett," he says slowly. "But I know I've had to force you to take them in the past- what's changed?"

"Nothing," she tells him, repressing the urge to roll her eyes.

"Nothing, huh?" He smiles at her, and she sees a twinkle in his eyes. "See you back here in a week, Beckett."

"Thank you," she tells him gratefully, standing and pushing the chair back in. She makes it almost to the door before the Captain speaks again.

"Tell Castle we miss him," he calls out.

* * *

Kate's heart is thumping in her chest as she drives, and she has to lift her foot from the pedal a few times; the last thing she needs is to be caught speeding. Or get into a car accident. She alternates between chewing on her lower lip and singing along to the radio, and she changes stations a dozen times between the Brooklyn Bridge and the Hamptons. She's not sure, if this is such a good idea anymore, and she contemplates turning around and heading back to the city. But each time she considers it, she's spurred on by thoughts of the conversation she'd had with Castle last night.

* * *

They hadn't actually spoken since Castle left for the Hamptons. Sticking to text messages has felt right to Kate; she's missed her… _writer_, but she's also been glad of the space. She's had a few quiet moments to herself between junctures in the case, and Beckett's assessed the situation as logically as possible.

Most of the messages have done nothing to quell the longing that Kate's feeling; she misses him, and she doesn't mind admitting that to herself. He makes her job just a little more fun. But it's not just the job; he makes her life a little more fun. He makes it a little warmer.

And when she thinks of the last time she'd seen him, the way they're stared at one another across the hospital bed… she thinks she's ready to stop pretending; she's ready to give in to the attraction she's been denying even before he offered to debrief her all those months ago.

Last night she had made it home a little earlier; the case had been solved by then and the team were just waiting on warrants to come through. Kate had carried a glass of wine into the bathroom. She'd then turned on the faucet and poured an obscene amount of bubble bath into the tub, and watched in a kind of childlike delight as the water swirled and became foamy. She'd stripped off, and stepped into the bath, sinking down, her eyes closed… she was ready to relax.

And then her cell had chimed.

She'd cursed softly, assuming the worst; this wouldn't be the first time dispatch had interrupted her from a soak in the tub. She'd reached out a hand to pull her cell to her ear and answered. "Beckett."

"Did you miss me, Detective?"

His voice had sent a chill of pleasure down her spine and brought a smile to her face. "Hey, Castle," she'd replied lazily. "What are you doing?"

"Just… hanging out," he'd told her. "Alexis and I watched a movie. Did you put the case to bed?"

"I did," she'd told him, setting the phone to speaker and placing it back onto the table next to her untouched glass of wine. "It was his sister."

"Why?"

"Money," she'd sighed. "He stood to inherit more than she did."

"Huh. Sounds kind of like our first case together." Castle had sounded delighted and Kate had pressed her lips together, repressing a smirk.

She'd reached for her wine glass, taking a sip of the red. "It kinda does," she'd agreed. "How's your arm?"

"Better," he'd said. "I'm off the painkillers now. Still can't type properly though. Gina's not impressed." He'd chuckled. "I miss the city, though."

"Oh yeah?" she'd asked. "What do you miss?"

"Mmm. I miss the precinct. I miss solving murder. I miss finishing up at the end of the day, and going home with you."

"We've never done that!" she'd protested.

"I miss opening a bottle of wine with you, and curling up with you on the sofa…"

She'd rolled her eyes. "We've never done that either."

There had been a soft chuckle on the other end. "Beckett?"

"Mmm?" She'd been getting sleepy and she was pleasantly surprised by how comforting it was to have Castle's voice on the other end of the phone.

"What are you doing?"

She'd smiled softly. "I'm curled up with a glass of wine," she'd told him. No need to mention the fact that she was naked and in a bubble bath.

"Oh. I wish I was there, sharing a bottle with you," He'd said, his voice low.

"I… kinda wouldn't mind that," she'd admitted.

There had been a silence for a moment, and then he'd spoken again. "Maybe it's a good thing I'm not there." His voice was soft and dangerous. Kate had felt her skin break into goose bumps and she'd shivered. Did this man know what he was doing to her? "If I was there right now..." Castle had broken off and she was left wanting more.

"If you were here right now?" she'd prompted, and the world had stilled for a moment.

"If I was there right now, I don't think I'd be able to help but kiss you."

Kate had been too stunned to say anything for a moment- all she could imagine was his mouth on hers- but she'd answered at last, trying her hardest to push the desire out of her voice. "If you were here right now..." she'd started. "You think I'd let you get into my tub with me?"

There had been a crash on the other end and she'd laughed softly. And then he'd spoken again, his voice nothing more than a squeak. "You- you're in the bath right now?"

* * *

She pulls up into the driveway with trepidation; when Kate had spoken to Alexis after she'd left the precinct the girl had warned her not to be intimidated by the house. She'd laughed it off, figuring that a New York cop couldn't be intimidated by a mere house, and reminded herself that she'd already seen Castle's loft, which was a very impressive piece of New York real estate.

But this… _mansion_ is not what she'd expected. This place is monumental.

Kate has checked her GPS twice; this is the place. She kills the engine and before she can summon the courage to get out of the car, the front door opens and a red-head flies out, a beaming smile on her face.

Alexis throws her arms around Kate, and the detective hugs her back. "Dad's going to be so excited that you're here," she tells Beckett.

"So you didn't tell him I was coming?"

Alexis shakes her head, and grins. "He loves surprises. Really, Detective Beckett, it will be fine."

Detective Beckett again. Interesting. Kate smiles at the red-head. "Kate, Alexis, it's Kate."

"Sorry," Alexis apologizes. "It's just- you're here- it feels different."

Kate bites her lip and allows Alexis to lead her into the house. She's not wrong; it does feel different.

"He's in there," Alexis whispers, nodding her head to indicate what looks like a cozy den. "You can interrupt."

Kate's eyes widen. "You're not coming in with me?"

Alexis laughs lightly. "Go ahead," she tells Kate. "I'll be upstairs." She darts away and Beckett is left standing in the doorway. She takes a hesitant step forward; she can see the back of Castle's head now. He's in an armchair, reading from his kindle.

Kate clears her throat. "I thought you'd be the kind of person who reviled e-books and only read the real thing," she starts, and he turns his head.

"No, I just can't-" he answers almost automatically, before shaking his head. "Turn the pages properly," he finishes lamely. "Beck- Kate?"

"Hey, Castle," she manages, biting down on her lower lip in an attempt to hide her smile.

"You're- what? How?"

He's not quite making sentences, and Beckett rolls her eyes affectionately. "Your daughter," she tells him. "Alexis knew I was coming- I spoke to her this afternoon."

"You talked to Alexis?" Delight is apparent in his voice, and Kate steps forward, moving into the room properly.

"Yeah. I, uh- closed the case." Castle takes a few steps closer to her as well, and their eyes lock. "And I talked to the Captain, and asked to take some of my vacation days."

"And you came here."

"And I came here," she agrees, taking another step toward him. They're face to face now, and Castle is beaming at her.

"So, Kate…" his left arm is still strapped to his chest, and he reaches out with his right hand, tucking a stray tendril of hair behind her ear. "_Why_ did you come here?"

She ducks her eyes, glancing at his lips, and recalls their phone conversation. "Maybe… you said something last night… that got me thinking."

"What did I say?" he breathes, and Kate has a wild moment where she's suddenly thankful that Alexis had the grace to excuse herself upstairs and leave Kate alone with Castle.

"You said… you didn't think you'd be able to help but kiss me."

"I see," he whispers, and then his free hand is back in her hair, and he's pulling her to him. His lips meet hers, gently at first, and then with a little more force; she's opening her mouth and kissing him back, and her arms are around him.

They break apart, foreheads resting against one another's for a moment as they both exhale.

He's beaming at her, and she knows his joy is mirrored in her own expression. She smiles shyly. "Was that worth coming all the way here?" he asks, and she grins, biting her lip, and looking up at him with a glimmer of amusement in her eyes. It was so worth it, but she shakes her head.

"It's been a traumatic couple of weeks... You just got shot... I drove all the way here… I think I'm going to need more than one kiss.

He chuckles, and pecks lightly at her lips again before speaking. "Why, Detective. What else did you have in mind?"

"I was thinking we could… read. Maybe watch TV. Or, we could start with dinner." She smiles, and it's her turn to press her lips against his. "Maybe… debrief a little."

* * *

**A/N: Whew! Many thanks to Trish and Kylie for their beta-ing and support. And thank to you guys for reading, following, favoriting and most of all, reviewing! I certainly didn't set out to write a case fic and in my naivety I had no idea how much I would have to mess with the mythology to settle it somehow- my hat goes off to case fic writers, truly! I'm deep in NaNoWriMo now, so my next fic won't be up til after November- hope to see you then!**


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